
Class 

Book ^ 

Copyriglitl^^- 



CfiiEXRIGHT DEPOSm 



FOR THE BENEFIT 

OF 

MY CREDITORS 



FOR THE BENEFIT 
OF MY CREDITORS 

BY 
HINCKLEY G. MITCHELL 



With Foreword by 

Dallas Lore Sharp 




PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 

THE BEACON PRESS 

25 Beacon Street Boston, Mass. 



> % 






Copyright, 1922 
The Estate of Hinckley G. Mitchell 



All rights reserved 



JUL -3 1922 

©C1.A677983 



FOREWORD 

"The consciousness of this sonship dominated his 
life and" .... and there the pen falls from the 
weary fingers ! He asked me to finish the sentence. 
I do not know what he intended to say. But I do 
know that the same consciousness dominated his 
life. If ever Jesus had a brother and God a see^ 
ond son it was Hinckley Gilbert Mitchell. And 
in the light of that conscious relationship how deadly 
a thing is orthodoxy! How petty, how futile, a 
faith that can cabin and confine God in doctrines 
and denominational creeds! 

Here is as modest and self -withholding a story 
as a man ever told of himself. It would never 
have been told, had the author not hated intellectual 
cowardice as he hated moral cowardice, — ^with a 
perfect hatred. He sought the truth, — in the 
Word of God, and in the minds of men. The 
geologist seeks some of the same truth in the rocks ; 
the astronomer in the stars. The Old Testament 
was Professor Hinckley Gilbert Mitchell's field; 
and laying aside tradition and the spirit of dogma it 
was as a scientist that he patiently, fearlessly, rev- 
erently sought for what his long and thorough prep- 
aration made him eminently able to find. 



vi FOREWORD 

Such was the timber of his mind. In his trial 
and condemnation by the Bishops of his Church, he 
felt that truth had been assailed and the scientific 
method. He did not write this book to defend 
himself. His trial was long past and most of his 
life had been lived, before a page of this was 
penned. He came at it reluctantly: it might seem 
vindictive, might hurt his beloved church; it might 
seem selfish, egotistical and petty, and so undo the 
work of years of honest living. But neither him- 
self nor his church was as important as the truth, 
and in his trial, truth had been tried and the only 
way of knowing truth had been condemned. So 
he sits down to this story of his life as to another 
Genesis, gratefully to account for the authorship 
of his being as a man and as a scholar, his prepara- 
tion, his attitude, his methods, — and incidentally 
that his conclusions might be proved; for he never 
claimed to have the ultimate and the whole truth. 
We may or may not have the truth about Evolu- 
tion, but we have a certain and a great truth in 
Darwin's mind and method. It was how Darwin 
tried to solve this problem, rather than the solution 
that has changed the thinking of the world. 

For three years I was a student of Hebrew and 
Old Testament Exegesis under Dr. Mitchell. I 
have forgotten all he taught me. But the way he 
taught me changed my outlook upon life. His 



FOREWORD tii 

attitude itself was truth, and flooded not only the 
whole mind, but one's whole being ^ with light. 
Many a time I have sat in his class room during 
the discussion of some highly difficult and danger- 
ous (doctrinally) question, and said to myself, 
amid the drawn daggers of those who had murder 
in their hearts, "Right or wrong his findings, he is 
himself the way, the truth, and the life of scholar- 
ship." 

He loved to teach. He loved to teach young 
preachers. He was not himself adapted to the 
pulpit. But he was the teacher born. The class 
room was his from the foundation of the world. 
Here he was preaching from many future pulpits. 
He saw his students at the ends of the earth speak- 
ing to the minds as well as to the hearts of men, 
revealing the intelligence no less than the love of 
God, and expounding a diviner Bible because it 
was so wholly human a Bible. In all of these 
future pulpits he heard his own voice speaking, 
his own simple sincere faith of the class room being 
given to men over the whole wide world. 

The thought of it thrilled him. It lifted him 
up. He dwelt in the presence of the opportunity 
as in the very presence of the Most High. As 
humble a man as I ever knew, doubting his every 
power and gift, and relying only on the truth to 
make him free, he would come into the class room 



viii FOREWORD 

and take his chair on the six-inch platform, which 
raised him by so much above his students, as if that 
platform were the Mount of Transfiguration. 
His face would shine; his voice, his gestures, his 
attitude working with his careful words, made his 
whole being radiant with zeal for the truth and love 
for us, his students, so mysteriously given to his 
care. And how we loved him in return! 

Then suddenly, after more than twenty years of 
this, he was expelled, — driven from this sacred 
class room and branded as unsound, unsafe, imfit! 

No, not suddenly. It was only the verdict of 
his judges that came suddenly. No one nowa- 
days could prepare his mind for a judgment hke 
that. For five or six of the years, during which 
the trouble makers, under pretense of study, had 
elected his courses at the Theological School, I 
had either been a student under him or his close 
and sympathetic friend, and though I prepared a 
brief paper in his defense for the Bishops, and 
knew as he knew that his enemies would stop at 
nothing in their bitter zeal, still I remember 
vividly the utter shock and astonishment of the 
Bishops' decision. And I remember, for I can- 
not forget, its strange numbing effect upon him. 
It came over him slowly, else I think he might 
have died. It crept upon him like a dreadful 
palsy, leaving him dazed and dumb. He was too 



FOREWORD ix 

simple a man to realize it quickly, too entirely 
single in mind and heart to realize it wholly. It 
slowly crushed him to the earth. And never in 
all the after years was he whole again. His heart 
was broken. He rose up and taught, until the 
very hour God called him to a larger place, but 
never again in his old class room nor with his 
former spirit. Day after day he would pass by 
the Theological School with its hundreds of eager 
students ; he would see them gathering at the hour 
of his lecture; but another teacher, (one whom he 
had trained), would come in and take his place, 
while he plodded down the street and out to a 
stranger school, a shepherd without his sheep. 

He forgave utterly; but he could not forget. 
He welcomed the new work at Tufts College. 
He found honor, and love, and fellowship there. 
They gave him freedom. They created a place 
for him that had not been before. He could teach 
what he wished and as he wished. It was enough 
for them to have him among them, and many a 
time he told me of how unworthy he felt of all this 
love and honor in his declining years, and how it 
had stayed and steadied him in his deep defeat. 
But they did not need him at Tufts, — so he felt. 
It was more for the honor of scholarship than for 
the good he would do them. But he felt that they 
did need him at his own beloved school, whose pol- 



X FOREWORD 

icies he had helped to shape, whose spirit he had 
helped to create, whose name and fame he had so 
largely helped to estabhsh, and whose students, 
crowding in from the east and from the great west, 
he longed to take into his heart and his home, as 
for so many happy years he had been in the habit 
of doing. 

"Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem," he would cry as he 
passed by on the street, a stranger, and saw the 
students going in and out, "Oh, Jerusalem, Jeru- 
salem, thou that stonest the prophets, . . . how 
oft would I have gathered thee under my wings as 
a hen gathereth her chickens, but ye would not." 

This, however, was not the doing of the school. 
The Theological School, faculty and students, 
with the exception of those few who came for the 
express purpose of accusing him, were loyal. The 
president of the University, his loving friend, was 
loyal, and did all that lay in his power to prevent 
the iniquity of the trial and the decision. This 
only added to the tragedy. To have been tried 
by his peers and co-laborers, by those who knew 
him and the field of his labors, would have chal- 
lenged him to a fair fight for his position; but to 
have been accused by three or four narrow-minded 
students, (one of whom recanted later and all of 
whom deserve oblivion), who had come with malice 
aforethought, whose very presence in the school 



FOREWORD xi 

was a lie, to be accused by such as these, I 
say, and then tried by a board of judges, to whom 
he was largely a stranger, not one of whom prob- 
ably was his equal as a scholar in the field involved, 
— this made the shame to the school, to himself, 
and to truth, doubly deep and sore. 

There remained one thing more for him to do; 
and as soon as he could do it lovingly as a Christ- 
ian, and dispassionately, as a scholar, without bias 
or prejudice or any personal ends except the ends 
of gratitude and truth, he set about this autobi- 
ography. And I wonder, if among autobiogra- 
phies, there is another that approaches this for 
detachment, restraint, and self -negation ; for ab- 
solute adherence to the facts for the sake of the 
truth involved, a truth not of self at all, but wholly 
of scholarship ? This is more of a thesis than an au- 
tobiography, — as if the author were writing of an* 
other Wall of Nehemiah, and no more involved 
in it personally, than he was present in The 
World Before Abraham! 

This is one of the most remarkable evidences of 
severe and scientific scholarship that I have ever 
seen ; and it is equal evidence of his Christian grace 
in a heart naturally stubborn and self-contained. 
No accusing word is here, nothing bitter and un- 
christian. But just the opposite: For the Ben- 
fit of my Creditors is a work of love. His very 



xii FOREWORD 

character had been assailed by his enemies, but this, 
while it hurt, could not harm him. He stood upon 
his conscious integrity calm and silent. It was 
not the attack upon himself that concerned him. 
It was that Truth had been attacked. His trial 
and condemnation struck straight at God. It was 
an attempt to make the Bible a denominational 
book; to confound truth with tradition and give it 
a doctrinal color or a denominational slant. The 
Church may compel its theologians to do that if it 
has to, but its scholars, those who discover truth, it 
should leave free. God and truth are not denom- 
inational, nor Protestant nor Catholic nor Hebrew. 
God is truth, and single or separate, God and Truth 
belong to the fearless, the frank, and the pure, — in 
science not more than in religion. For are ye not 
as children of the Ethiopians unto me, O children 
of Israel? Have not I brought up Israel out of 
the land of Egjrpt? and the Philistines from Caph- 
tor, and the Syrians from Kir? 

That God had led the Philistines and the Syr- 
ians, no less than the Israelites was the great lesson 
I was taught by Professor Mitchell. I recall the 
day we came upon that wonderful passage in 
Amos in our study of this favorite prophet; and 
how for the first time in my hfe the universality of 
truth dawned upon me out of that passage. I had 
been worshipping a tribal, denominational God, up 



FOREWORD xiii 

to that time. I had been seeing different kinds of 
truth, — like the different tribes of old in Palestine 
— warring truths, each with its own territory, its 
own grip upon me, when suddenly as Professor 
Mitchell opened up this mighty saying of Amos, 
I saw one God of us all, one truth for us all, and 
all of us searching, under God's leading, for the 
truth. Henceforth the Philistines and the Syr- 
ians and the children of Israel were to be as the 
Ethiopians to me, as they are to God, — all of us 
led by him, and all of us free. No teacher ever 
taught me a diviner lesson than that. 

It was not a body of truth that this great teacher 
was called to expound. It was the spirit of truth, 
— the desire for truth, the search for truth, the 
nature of truth that it is God, — ^this was his high 
calling. And in condemning him, his Church was 
confounding tradition and truth, blocking the road 
to truth, and threatening, in this example of him, 
to punish the daring who discover and bring us 
forward into new realms of truth. In his trial 
and condemnation the church was saying: "Study, 
but study to perpetuate the past; to preserve the 
old; to defend doctrine, and establish tradition. 
We have the truth, the whole truth, and nothing 
but the truth. No new light can possibly break 
forth from God's word, or from any word. 
Revelation is closed. And if you think you have 



xiv FOREWORD 

new light, hide it, and if you discover new truth, 
do not publish it, do not teach it, for among the 
three hundred men in your school there are three 
who have closed their minds to light and truth, 
and have sworn by all the past to keep them 
closed; and it would jeopardize the Church if you 
should pry those three minds open to the light 
and to the truth of to-day." 

These are not his words. There is a tang of 
bitterness in them. They are mine. Yet it was 
partly because he believed exactly that, believed 
that the Church meant to make him a warning 
to all scholars and honest thinkers within its fold, 
that he set about this autobiography, which 
hastened his end and which he died writing. 

"Rabbi," we students called him affectionately, 
and strangely enough he seemed to look the part. 
He was the thorough scholar. Careful, methodical 
by nature, he was German trained, and to all of this 
was added a profound reverence for the Book 
which was his life's study, and a deep sense of all 
his responsibility as its teacher. Had his life's 
task been a haystack with one single needle of 
divine truth lost within it, he would have tirelessly 
taken it down, straw by straw, for the needle of 
truth, just as Madame Curie, aware of some 
mysterious power in the crude common bulk of 
slag, patiently eliminated pound after pound, ton 



FOREWORD XV 

after ton of the gross elements until she held in 
her hand the pulsing particle of radium, hardly- 
larger than the head of a pin, whose light illumines 
and almost bhnds the groping world. Had 
Professor Mitchell not been a student of the 
Bible, he might have been a student of chemistry, 
for his methods and his zeal were exactly those of 
the discoverer in any field, and it might have been 
his honor and glory, as it chanced to be Madame 
Curie's, to give radium to the world. 

Instead of glory, his was condemnation and 
defeat. Yet his very mind and method, applied 
anywhere else, would have won him distinction and 
honor. There is no other mind or method, except 
the closed mind and the method of appeal to 
authority, as against the trial by experiment and 
fact. Truth is truth whether in Theology or in 
Chemistry, and only the open mind, the free, the 
bold, the experimenting mind finds it. Traditions 
have to be defended. Truth is its own defense. 
The mind of Professor Mitchell was never on 
the defensive. Let "the Forts of Folly fall," he 
was far over the frontier where there was no need 
for forts. So here in his life he writes not to 
defend himself, but to express himself, his grat- 
itude; and to explain himself, his position, his 
purpose, his principles as to the way of truth, the 
light of truth, the truth of truth. 



xvi FOREWORD 

Professor Mitchell was as simple as he was 
sincere. But simpHcity in a great spirit is the 
sign, the very expression of sincerity. He was in- 
terested in all human things. He could make 
wonderful coffee. He could build a stone wall 
with the best of masons, and how he used to tramp 
the woods with me for mushrooms! 

I was a stranger in Boston and had been in his 
classes for a week perhaps, when I met him down- 
town. It was a very real pleasure to be stopped 
and called by name and quizzed by the great 
teacher. What was I looking for in Boston? A 
hammer? "Come along," he said, turning short 
about, "there's a good hardware store down this 
street. I'll go with you and see that you get a 
Maydole, — a Maydole now, — they're the only 
wear in hammers." I got the Maydole; that was 
twenty-six years ago; I have it yet. His was a 
little act. But I have drawn many a nail with 
that hammer. Yea, I have built him a mansion 
with it. 

I speak of that little thing here because it was 
such a characteristic act. The details of life 
tremendously interested him. He was entirely 
human and as interested in the human side of his 
students as he was in their intellectual and spir- 
itual sides. From my study window here in 
Hingham as I write, eight stone faces stare at me 



FOREWORD xvii 

out of the retaining wall in the driveway, big 
granite chunks of boulder they were in my mead- 
ow years ago. It was Professor Mitchell who 
rigged the tackle and helped me put those stones 
here in the wall. He could fix a toggle, he could 
"cut" and "pize" and "wop" a stone with lever and 
chain so as to "move mountains." "There! 
There!" he would say, "let the mare do the work; 
let the mare do the work," when I would rush up 
at a quarter-ton chunk of solid granite and, bare- 
handed, try to hustle it onto the stone boat. 

He had built stone waUs before, — ^back on the 
hill farm in New York State where he was born 
and had his boyhood. Later he "restored" the 
Wall of Nehemiah about Jerusalem, but not with 
any more zest than he helped me build with actual 
stones the retaining wall from my driveway up 
Mullein Hill in Hingham. 

Can the helpfulness and inspiration of such a 
teacher be measured? Theological students are 
as naturally full of trouble as rag-weeds are of 
pollen. They know enough to doubt; they are 
old enough to be married; they are poor; and they 
preach; and they would hke to be pious; but the 
world and the flesh and the devil are against them. 
They are only as good as the average of mankind, 
but they have more than an average share of trib- 
ulations. They need Hebrew, — all of them, — 



xviii FOREWORD 

which is one more terrible trouble ! But they sorely 
need human sympathy and wise counsel, and 
whether they got Hebrew or failed to get it, never 
a man came into Professor Mitchell's class room who 
did not also enter at the same moment into the great 
teacher's open heart and open home. Class room 
and heart and home belonged to every man who 
would enter. Professor Mitchell's capacity for 
patience in the class room was only equalled by the 
boundless sympathy and the simple hospitality of 
his nearby home. I do not believe he allowed him- 
self to give me any more than he gave to all. 
Perhaps I cared more and took more than my 
share of what he offered to us all alike. From the 
day of the Maydole hammer to the day of his 
death, more than twenty-five years later, he never 
failed of interest in my personal affairs. When 
I was graduating from the Theological School, 
President Warren of the University sent for me. 
I thought I was to be disciplined for something. 
To my astonishment I was asked to join the teach- 
ing staff of the University, I have been on that 
staff ever since. It was Professor Mitchell who 
had suggested this to the President, utterly un- 
dreamed of by me. 

Is it a wonder that the great body of his students 
were confounded and dismayed that he could be 
tried on some technical point or other and be 



FOREWORD xix 

ejected from his chair as unfit to teach the preach- 
ers of the gospel of Christ? 

The Mitchell home was childless, but not the 
Mitchell heart; and perhaps the perfect and beau- 
tiful devotion of husband and wife was actually 
deepened by their complete dependence, each on 
the other. Sturdy, independent thinkers, both of 
them, they often thought apart, but they always 
acted together in an ideal union. Never was a 
man more nobly devoted to a woman. 

And throughout the years of his trial, and loss 
of place and income, she was his stay and comfort. 
Few men owe more to their wives than Professor 
Mitchell, for his whole life, every side of it found 
in her a stimulus, a high fine challenge, and an 
approval that is life's largest, best reward. 

Not long after his own strange fate at the hands 
of his Church, there fell upon her a terrible stroke, 
with only years of hopeless invalidism to follow. 
She was never to be able to help herself again. 
For both of them now had come the supreme 
passage of life, but the deep things of the past had 
prepared them. Nothing in human life that I 
have seen was nobler, lovelier than the devotion of 
these two down all the years of suffering, — ^years 
of sympathy and mutual support. 

A house of old books, of fine old things, of old 
world things particularly, there was always the 



XX FOREWORD 

peculiar quiet and yet the peculiar air of activity 
about the Mitchell home, so characteristic of the 
working scholar. It was an ideal home for us 
students to know, especially if we had wives, as 
many of us had, and I wonder if any other home in 
all the land was so much of an inspiration to so 
many young men and women as the Mitchell's 
home during those many student years? 

After the trial the enforced leisure was imme- 
diately turned to new studies and larger literary 
plans. Fresh fields were opened, too, for lectur- 
ing, — in the University of Chicago, in Harvard 
University; and then soon came the invitation to 
join the staff of Tufts Theological School as a 
member of the faculty. Life has its compensa- 
tions and rewards; and if there were no cure for 
the mortal wound he had received at the hands of 
his brethren in his own Church, this invitation to 
Tufts, and the perfect fellowship there to the day 
he died, was a compensation and a satisfaction that 
gave to his life a sweet reasonableness, complete- 
ness and reward. 

There was no variableness nor shadow caused 
by turning in his unhurried life. For the loss of 
his professorship did not mean the end of Professor 
Mitchell's creative scholarship. He worked to the 
end and was preparing for the day's work when 
the end came. He knew our hearts, but we our- 



FOREWORD xxi 

selves hardly knew them till he had gone. Then 
the swift word reached us, and we were told that 
we should see him no more, that he was to be buried 
back in New York State with no service of any 
kind for him here, — ^here where he had labored so 
many years ! It could not be. On every hand his 
old pupils appeared. King's Chapel was offered 
for the funeral. The Chapel Choir volunteered 
to sing. The minister, the Reverend Dr. Brown, 
of the Chapel, would speak, so would Dean 
McCollester of the Tufts Theological School and 
Ex-President William E. Huntington of Boston 
University, his President during the trial and his 
life-long friend, — Methodist, Universalist, Unita- 
rian, — in one mind, all differences forgotten in 
their single love for the honest scholar, the direct, 
the earnest, the sincere teacher, and the simple 
Christ-hke man, whose whole life had been a 
devotion to learning and to doing good. 

Dallas Lore Sharp. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Foreword by Dallas Lore Sharp v 

Why Write? 1 

Birth and Parentage 3 

Earliest Years 6 

Glimpses of Larger Things 15 

An Interlude 28 

In College 34* 

A Beginning in Theology 42 

A Student in Germany 55 

My First and Only Parish 74 

The First Five Years in Boston 87 

A Trip to Palestine 96 

A Brief but Happy Period 103 

A Time of Refreshing 108 

Errors and Misunderstandings 118 

The Wider Field 129 

Zeal without Knowledge 143 

A Change of Venue .152 

Two Fruitful Years 174 

A Legislative Muddle 199 

The World Before Abraham Assailed 206 

The World Before Abraham Defended . . . .218 



CONTENTS 

PAGB 

"Tell It not in Gath!" 236 

A Teacher at Large 254 

At the Seat of Authority 271 

Some Tributes 311 



II 



WHY WRITE? 

For some time I have foimd myself dwelling on 
my past and recalling, as people well along in years 
usually do, with more than ordinary clearness, 
especially, scenes and events of my early life. At 
first I was content with merely recalling them; 
then I began to tell my friends about them; but 
lately I have felt the impulse to put them into 
writing, and not only them, but the more significant 
things in my later experience. Not that I think 
my career a remarkable one, or that, in the course 
of it, I have made the world in any great degree my 
debtor. Far from it. In fact, as I look back 
through the years, I see more and more clearly 
that I owe the world, or that part of it with which 
I have been brought into closest contact, much 
more than it owes me. When, therefore, I have 
thought of writing, I have been moved thereto, not 
so much by pride in anything personal, but by a 
gratitude for the helpful acts and influences 
brought to bear upon my life which demanded ex- 
pression. I cannot repay them, but I can confess 
judgment. 



BIRTH AND PARENTAGE 

There is a saying that it is a great thing to be 
well born, that is, I suppose, to come of decent, if 
not distinguished, lineage. It is a great thing be- 
cause the traits of parents are likely to reappear in 
their children from generation to generation, and, 
if these traits are worthy, they form a basis for a 
respectable character. Moreover, one who is well 
born naturally feels more or less proud of his 
lineage and takes some care not to disgrace it. I 
know that I have more than once been influenced 
in this way since I found the name of my great- 
grandfather Mitchell in the Connecticut Rolls, as a 
soldier of the Revolution, and learned that my 
grandmother on my father's side, who was a 
Hinckley, was descended from Ensign John, a 
brother of Samuel, the last Governor of Plymouth 
Colony, with strains from the Breeds of Lynn, 
Mass., and the Denisons of Stonington, Conn. 
My mother's parents were simple, but very worthy 
people, who, moreover, brought new blood into the 
family; for her father, John Rowlands, who, after 
a curious Welsh custom, always went by the name 
of Thomas (John [son of] Thomas [Rowlands]), 
was a recent immigrant from Nevin, Wales, when 
he married Sarah Gilbert, of German descent, who, 



4 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

like himself, was in the service of the Whartons of 
Philadelphia and Germantown. I, therefore, have 
in me the blood of at least three races, which per- 
haps explains my wide sympathies and my freedom 
from prejudice. 

The Thomases did not stay in or near Phila- 
delphia but removed to Oneida County, N. Y., and 
settled near the small but sightly village of Pros- 
pect. There, and later in the village itself, my 
mother, Sarah Gilbert, grew up. Meanwhile my 
father, at the age of seventeen, had come from the 
adjoining town of Remsen to the village, where he 
first served an apprenticeship as a would-be mer- 
chant and afterward taught school. It is not 
strange, therefore, that the two became acquainted 
and, on my father's twenty-first birthday, December 
23, 1844, were made man and wife. 

The next spring after their marriage the young 
couple left Prospect for a farm in Lee, seven or 
eight miles north of Rome, where, on the twenty- 
second of February, 1846, I first saw the light. 
They moved again soon after my arrival. In fact, 
I believe I was only two weeks old, when my father 
bundled my mother and me into a cutter, filled with 
blankets and drawn by the best horse he could com- 
mand, and took us back to Prospect, where he was 
again going into business. 

I have never seen the day when I wished I had 



BIRTH AND PARENTAGE 5 

never been born. On the contrary, I have thanked 
God many a time, that he gave me my being and 
that he put me into the arms of the pair I was per- 
mitted to call my parents. They were very unlike, 
but they were both among the greatest of my credi- 
tors. My father was active and enterprising, and, 
until the panic of 1873 wrecked his plans, a pros- 
perous merchant and farmer. He was sometimes 
brusque in his manner, but he was kind and gentle 
at heart, especially toward women and children. 
In business he was the soul of honor, and not only 
fair, but generous. As a citizen he was loyal and 
tolerant, but progressive and, in the expression of 
his convictions or the performance of his duties, 
perfectly fearless. My mother was cool and delib- 
erate, and very persistent. My father once testi- 
fied to her possession of the last characteristic in an 
unusual degree. I had told him that she was going 
to do a certain something. "Did she say she was 
going to do it?" he inquired. I replied in the 
affirmative. '*Well, then," he remarked, "she'll do 
it." I will leave it to the reader to say later 
whether I have shown myself worthy of such par- 
ents. I will confess that in at least one instance I 
came short of my mother's tenacity of purpose, by 
abandoning a concordance of the Hebrew particles 
on which I had spent some months and of which I 
had published many pages. 



EARLIEST YEARS 

We remained only two years in Prospect, and I 
am not sm-e that I remember anything that hap- 
pened there. The first impressions vivid enough 
to last were made upon my mind after we went back 
to Lee, but this time to the northern part, and my 
father went into business at West Branch, a little 
hamlet so called because it was on the west fork of 
the Mohawk River. The locality was a picturesque 
one, and our house was pretty well situated, for a 
little brook ran along one side of it and emptied 
into a pond, made by the river, at the foot of our 
back garden ; and across the pond was a high ridge, 
partly wooded, to which mother and I used to go 
for wild flowers and berries. The wilder scenery 
farther down the river took such a hold upon me 
that, to this day, when I try to imagine where I 
should like a bungalow, I find myself borrowing 
features from those early surroundings. 

I have already said enough to indicate that my 
mother loved the out-of-doors. There was other 
evidence of it. In winter the window on the south 
side of her kitchen was always full of fuchsias, gera- 
niums, and other flowering plants, and in summer 
the little three-cornered plot between the house and 



EARLIEST YEARS 7 

the brook was gay with them. I helped her when 
she made this bed, and when, later, she invaded the 
back garden and appropriated a corner of it, I was 
her accomplice and assistant. My father protested 
against her encroachments, but he came to take a 
secret pride and pleasure in our flowers, and, when 
he saw my interest in growing things, he allowed 
me to help him, too, in his front garden, and even 
with his onion bed, the part in which he most de- 
lighted. These lessons in gardening marked the 
beginning of my education, for they not only gave 
me pleasure at the time, but produced results from 
which I have profited to this day. 

I cannot say at what age I began to go to a 
proper school. It was probably not very early, for 
there were no kindergartens in those days and the 
schoolhouse was a good half mile from our door. 
Whenever it was, I started off, as I can remember, 
with my hand in that of the teacher, who was my 
mother's brother William. He was my favorite 
uncle, a big, jolly fellow, who, however, could be 
stern, when it was necessary, as it sometimes was, 
with the older boys. I loved him because he under- 
stood boys, and, when he finally married and settled 
near my birthplace, I liked nothing better than to 
pay him and his wife visits, and long ones. I par- 
ticularly enjoyed Sunday with him, because his wife 
was a wonderful cook, and, on that day, while she 



8 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

was reading the weekly paper, he and I lunched 
in the pantry. Uncle William would take a pie, a 
pumpkin or an apple pie in its season, draw a 
knife through the middle of it, and say: "Here, 
young man; this is my half and that's yours. Fill 
your jacket." And I did. What boy would hesi- 
tate to accept so generous an estimate of his capac- 
ity? 

I think I must have learned to read before I 
went to school. I cannot otherwise account for the 
progress I thereafter made, especially in figures ; in 
which, by the time I was not more than ten, I had 
gone farther than some of my schoolmates who 
were twice my age. I had, of course, a number of 
teachers during this period, some of whom, I heard 
it said, were not very competent, but all of whom 
helped me, if only to the extent of holding a book 
while I recited what I had learned from it. There 
was one, however, who did more for me than all 
the rest. She was but a girl when I first went to 
school to her, a slight creature, with light hair and 
eyes, and in her cheeks a dainty pink which, on the 
slightest occasion, deepened to a blush; but there 
were lines about her mouth that indicated unusual 
strength of character. It was her courage that 
made her reputation, when, having taken the place 
of a man who had failed, she restored order by 
threshing half a dozen of her oldest pupils, one of 



EARLIEST YEARS 9 

whom was her own brother. I do not remember 
that she ever punished me. It was not necessary. 
When I offended she needed only to take a fold of 
one of my cheeks between her thumb and finger and 
look me steadily in the eye ; whereupon I promptly 
confessed my guilt and promised anything she re- 
quired. Indeed, Emily Underbill seems to have 
stirred, so to speak, my moral nature more than 
anyone before, even my father by his sometimes 
pretty severe discipline. When I came to know 
her more intimately, as my mother's nearest friend 
and almost a member of the family, her influence 
over me continued, and even now there is no one 
whose approbation I value more highly. 

There was no church at the Branch ; still the com- 
munity there and thereabout was not a godless one. 
In the first place, it was on a Methodist "circuit" 
and its minister came regularly to preach in the 
schoolhouse. Later he lived at the Branch, where 
a Sunday school was then started. The brother 
chosen to conduct it called on my mother to ask her 
to send me. I was present when he called, and at; 
once informed him that I thought five days enough 
to spend in school. My mother, paying no atten- 
tion to the interruption, to my surprise, when the 
man left, quietly assured him that I would be there; 
— and I was. I finally took to the School because 
it meant books to read, but I preferred that of the 



10 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Methodist service at the long low meeting-house, a 
mile from the Branch, where the Quakers of the 
surrounding country held their assemblies. I used 
to go out there alone and sit as quiet and solemn as 
they, even when no one was "moved" to break the 
silence, for the privilege of shaking hands at the 
close with the grave, but kind, old men who were 
present. I heard very little among the Quakers 
or the Methodists that left a lasting impression, 
except the text of a sermon preached at the funeral 
of one of my father's teamsters, killed in an acci- 
dent, of whom I was very fond. It was: "Be ye 
also ready, for in such an hour as ye think not the 
Son of Man cometh." It haunted me for years, 
and even now it often casts a shadow over my early 
recollections. 

A NEW HOME 

The year 1857 was a fateful one for many. My 
grandfather was among those who found themselves 
in a critical financial condition. My father, to be 
able to help him, disposed of his business and 
bought a farm on the outskirts of the village of 
Kemsen, two or three miles from Prospect and only 
four from his birthplace. He then took in hand 
his father's affairs and, by the skilful handling of 
their common resources, came through the panic 
without serious loss for either of them. 



EARLIEST YEARS n 

Our removal to Remsen marked the beginning of 
a new period in my life. In the first place, 
whereas, before this I had known nothing about 
anything that could be called work, I now had more 
or less serious duties, for, although my father did 
not himself manage the farm, the tenant, Miss Un- 
derbill's father, was given to understand that my 
brothers and I — there were now three of us and a 
sister — went with it, and that he might use us when 
he needed our help as well as that of his own boys. 
There were times, of course, when we were unhappy 
under this arrangement, but I, for my part, finally 
found that the opportunity to learn, as I then did, 
the use of my hands and the resources of the country 
was a great blessing, and I can still say that the re- 
sults have been of unqualified advantage to me all 
my life. 

There is another respect in which the new loca- 
tion proved more advantageous to me than the old 
one. At West Branch we were eleven miles from 
the nearest railroad ; which I can remember to have 
seen but once or twice before we moved. We had, 
to be sure, a fine plank-road, and the stagecoach, 
whose arrival was an event "new every morning 
and fresh every evening," but there was nothing 
great or wonderful about a stagecoach. A train 
of cars, on the other hand, with its smoking, shriek- 
ing engine, was a stupendous manifestation, with 



12 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

which, although I saw it several times a day, — 
the railroad ran for a mile through the farm, — I 
never became so familiar with it that it ceased 
powerfully to stimulate my imagination. 

For the first few years after we removed to Rem- 
sen my educational advantages were no better than 
they had been at Branch ; for, although we lived in 
the village, the farm lay mostly in an adjoining 
district, and it was the school in this district which 
my father helped to support, and to which, there- 
fore, his children were expected to go. ISTow, the 
people in the district were nearly all comfortable 
farmers, but, as they had not many children and 
were inclined to frugality, they made but modest 
appropriations for education. The result was that 
the teacher, whether the man in the winter or the 
woman in the summer, who was usually without 
much ability or experience, seldom stayed more 
than one term or encouraged us to go beyond the 
common branches. There was, however, now and 
then an exception. I remember one such with es- 
pecial tenderness and gratitude. I must have been 
about fourteen when she took our school for the 
summer, an age at which, if there is any mischief 
or meanness in a boy, it is apt to show itself. 
She was the daughter of a clergyman who had a 
wide reputation as a preacher and the editor of a 
Welsh periodical, and she herself had been carefully 



EARLIEST YEARS 13 

educated. But she was not much, if any, larger 
than I, and so timid that she must often have found 
it a heavy "cross" to open the school with some 
verses from the Bible and a brief prayer, as she did 
every morning. I am sure I gave her more than a 
little anxiety, as, for example, when, after she ha3 
punished (very gently) my sister for whispering, I, 
merely to embarrass her, came forward with the 
confession that I, too, had whispered, and thus 
forced her to punish me. In the end, however, she 
conquered me, and so completely that I became her 
most devoted pupil, for she not only taught me 
what religion meant but made it lovely and attrac- 
tive. 

About this time my father and mother renewed 
their religious vows. They had both been reared 
as Methodists, and my father had always gener- 
ously contributed to the support of that commun- 
ion, — at the Branch the donation for their minister 
had more than once been held at our house, — 
but the cares of business and poUtics — he had served 
one term in the State Legislature — had so en- 
grossed his time and attention that he had neglected 
his religious duties. I very distinctly remember 
when, as he expressed it, he "rebuilt the family 
altar." One morning, after breakfast, he asked us 
all to come into the Hving-room for a few minutes. 

When we were gathered there he first, with tears 



14 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

in his eyes, confessed that he had failed in his duty 
to God and to us and begged us to forgive, as he 
felt that God had done, his remissness. Then after 
a few verses from the Bible and a hymn, he put 
up the first prayer I had ever heard from his lips. 
His humility and earnestness so deeply affected 
me, that, as soon as possible I rushed from the room, 
and it was some time before I could dry my eyes 
and go about my work. Of course, from that day 
I was constantly reminded of my personal duty to 
my Maker, but it was some time before I was moved 
to take any public steps in the matter. 



GLIMPSES OF LARGER THINGS 

I have referred to the railroad and the effect of 
the rushing trains. It was powerful, but, as I 
never actually rode any distance on them, they did 
not, so far as I can recollect, much enlarge my 
ideal world. The same seems to have been true of 
geography, which was my favorite study that sum- 
mer term of my fourteenth year under Miss 
Everett. It was practically a series of exercises 
in mnemonics, and not of adventures in the hitherto 
unknown. 

The next winter, however, my eyes were to some 
extent opened. I was having my last term in the 
district school. The teacher was a rising young 
man who was preparing for the Methodist ministry. 
He had studied in the academy at Prospect, and 
had taken at least one term of Latin. When he 
found that I had gone over all the subjects studied 
in our district, some of them more than once, he 
suggested that I take Latin. As my father made 
no objection, he secured a grammar (Andrews and 
Stoddard) and a reader (Andrews) and we began 
our lessons. He was not a remarkable teacher: it 
was not necessary that he should be, for I was so 
eager to get on that I was willing to spend any 

15 



16 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

amount of time and thought on my work and he 
had little to do but hear me recite. The result was 
that, by the end of the term I had mastered the 
paradigms and the syntactical parts of the grammar 
and read many pages of Latin, including the fables 
of ^sop; in fact, done nearly as much in quantity, 
I afterwards learned, as I should have been ex- 
pected to do at most schools in two terms. Mean- 
while — and this is the important part of the story — 
my teacher, who was preparing for college, had 
told me his plans and gone so far as to suggest to 
my father that I go with him to the Seminary where 
he intended to finish his preparation. Thus I came 
to know that there were schools on schools and 
timidly to dream of fields of knowledge of which 
three months before I had hardly suspected the 
existence. 

I ought, of course, with this flying start, to have 
gone at once to Falley Seminary, the preparatory 
school in Fulton recommended by my teacher; but 
this was not to be. Though disappointed and, 
since my father was managing the farm himself, 
obliged to give the most of my time and strength 
to the work required by a large dairy, I did not 
despair or allow myself to grow rusty in my studies. 
I spent the evenings with my books, and sometimes 
took one with me when I saw a prospect of having 
a few minutes to myself during the day; for ex- 



GLIMPSES OF LAKGER THINGS 17 

ample, when we were using one team with two 
wagons, and I knew that I could load one of the 
wagons and still have time to read a few lines of 
Latin before the man returned from the field with 
the other. 

I ought here to confess that I was not ordinarily 
a rapid worker. This was partly due to the fact 
that I was small and not very strong, but quite as 
much to the pains I took with everything it fell to 
me to do. These facts were not always taken into 
account. Thus, when there began to be talk of 
making a minister of me, my grandfather who had 
a good deal of dry humor, remarked that I would 
"make a good man for an afternoon app'intment." 
My father, however, sometimes showed his appre- 
ciation of my conscientiousness. On one occasion, 
when he was comparing his three oldest boys, he 
said that when he wanted a thing done well and did 
not care how long it took, he sent me. This speech 
naturally pleased me at the time, also afterwards 
when, as sometimes happened, through stopping 
to pick stones off a meadow or put a fallen rail back 
upon a fence, I was belated. 

I might, perhaps, have gone away to school when 
fall came, but for an event which had great signif- 
icance, not only for me, but for all the young 
people of our village ; namely, the appearance of a 
gentleman, — I use the word advisedly, because from 



18 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

the first he impressed us by his cultivated manner, 
-—who, after a brief canvass, opened a select school. 
As this gentleman was an old friend of my parents 
and the young people of the village and the sur- 
rounding country in numbers were enrolling as 
his pupils, it was not difficult for me to get permis- 
sion to join them. The result was so satisfactory 
that, when I call the roll of my favorite teachers, 
Dean M. Jenkins is always of the number. In the 
first place, he introduced studies, like algebra, for 
which the district school made no provision; and, 
secondly, he made us feel the cultural value of edu- 
cation. I remember him with especial gratitude 
because he taught me that there was more in poetry 
than rhyme and metre, and showed an interest in 
me personally by lending me a copy of Scott's 
Lady of the Lake. He must also have recom- 
mended to me another easily intelligible writer, 
Longfellow, for the next summer I invested the last 
cent of my savings in a copy of his poetical works. 

I was not the only one who profited by the work 
of Mr. Jenkins among us. His pupils generally 
appreciated it. In fact, the whole community felt 
his influence. This showed itself in the Good Tem- 
plar's Lodge, which served the purpose of a literary 
society, also in a general interest in books and 
reading. There were in the village at that time — 
it was during the Civil War — an unusual number 



GLIMPSES OF LARGER THINGS 19 

of young unmarried women. Some of them be- 
came my friends, lending me books and inviting me 
to their homes. The natural effect of such compan- 
ionship was to increase my fondness for good litera- 
ture and, at the same time, to prevent me from 
attalching myself to men or boys whose influence 
would have been harmful. They did me "good and 
not evil" as long as I remained in Remsen. The 
least I can do, therefore, is to pay them this heart- 
felt tribute. 

A CHANGEFUL COURSE 

I had two terms in the Select School, then, be- 
cause Mr. Jenkins no longer headed it, besought my 
father to let me go to F alley, and he finally con- 
sented. My first term there was that of the winter 
of 1862-3. The Principal at the time was John 
P. Griffin, a teacher, in his day, as successful in 
the employment of the ruUng educational methods 
as any in the country. He required absolute ex- 
actness in his students. When one of them at- 
tempted to excuse an imperfection, he used to say, 
"almost right is always wrong." It might seem 
impossible for anyone with every recitation marked 
on a scale of ten, to get a perfect standing; yet, 
strange as it may seem, there were always some who, 
even in his classes, achieved it. They were encour- 
aged to try for it because they knew that he would 



20 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

do his part, and that, if he could, he would make 
them all successful. He was also a very strict dis- 
ciplinarian. He based his practice in the matter 
on the sincere conviction that, as he said, he stood 
to his students in loco parentis, and that, therefore, 
it was his duty to guard and guide them in their 
conduct as well as in their studies. Many were 
restive imder this really benevolent watchfulness; 
others positively resented it. They did not like to 
have him suddenly appear in their rooms without 
knocking or meet them wandering out of bounds in 
study hours. Now and then one tried to bait him, 
like the young man suspected of using liquor, who 
brushed his teeth with bay rum just before calHng 
at the office. 

I have dwelt on Professor Griffin's ideas on edu- 
cation and discipline as the chief factor in the suc- 
cess of his Seminary. Now, as I recall the impres- 
sion made by the institution as a whole, I feel that 
perhaps I have not done either it or its worthy 
head justice. It has occurred to me as a singular 
fact, that, although the Principal himself, by the 
sternness of his requirements, often repelled his 
students, the Faculty, seven or eight in number, 
always consisted of persons who were not only ex- 
cellent teachers but genial and attractive ladies and 
gentlemen. Of course, they helped to bring and 
keep students, but he certainly deserved credit, not 



GLIMPSES OF LARGER THINGS 21 

only for keen insight and wisdom in the choice of 
his helpers, but for a tolerance which enabled them, 
without loss of self-respect or individuality, to re- 
main for years in his employ. 

My first term at F alley was a memorable one, 
especially because it started me on a course which, 
whether long or short, would be definite and pro- 
gressive, taught me regular habits of study, and 
clarified my ideas concerning scholarship. For the 
progress made in the last respect I was indebted to 
Professor Grifiin himself, who was one of my 
teachers. The result of that term with him, how- 
ever, was not clear gain; for the subject was Latin 
and, although he prided himself, and justly, on his 
skill in handling it, in my case this skill was mis- 
applied, because, taking for granted that I had 
done only the usual amount of work in my one term, 
he put me into his second class and drilled me three 
more months on the first pages of Andrews' 
Reader, which I already knew almost by heart. 
Consequently it was another year, the third after 
I began the study of Latin, before I was permitted 
really to taste the flavor of the language; when I 
had acquired so great a dislike for it that I have 
never been able to enjoy any of its famous litera- 
ture except the Odes of Horace, and I have some- 
times wished that he might have been born in some 
other country than Italy. 



22 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Tiresome as I found the relentless driU on the 
subjunctive, the oratio obliqua, etc., it did not pre- 
vent me from doing conscientious work, even in 
Latin. Consequently, when I went home in the 
spring, I was pretty well satisfied with myself and 
eager to continue my studies. I begged to be al- 
lowed to return for the next term, but my father 
refused his consent: which I could not understand, 
as he was prospering and I had heard him criti- 
cise his father for not encouraging him to get a 
liberal education. Indeed, I was very unhappy 
over the matter and shed many bitter tears in my 
mother's lap as she was trying to comfort me. 
Sometimes I gave way to angry and resentful feel- 
ings and they only increased my wretchedness. I 
became so desperate that, one day, I remember, I 
went to a grove back of the house and spent some 
time praying that I might have my desire, finally 
promising that, if my prayer was answered, I would 
thenceforth try to lead a religious life. It was 
not answered at once, but the next winter I re- 
turned to the Seminary, and I was so grateful that 
I did not hesitate about fulfilling my vow. 

There was nothing spectacular about my conver- 
sion. Soon after the beginning of the term I went 
to the weekly meeting in the Chapel and, when an 
opportunity was given, made my purpose known. 
Professor Griffin, deeply interested, after the meet- 



GLIMPSES OF LARGER THINGS 23 

ing advised me to go with one of the older students 
to a Methodist church, where special services were 
in progress. I went and there repeated my confes- 
sion. Thereupon my case was made a subject of 
prayer. I also prayed for myself, but it was not 
until I reached my room and had retired for the 
night that, as I lay perfectly submissive to the di- 
vine will, my mind was flooded as with light, with 
the conviction that my offering was accepted. 
From that time to this, I have never doubted that 
I then and there came into a new relation with my 
Heavenly Father. In the spring, therefore, when 
I went home, I was baptized and admitted to the 
church by the local Pastor, a devout man, who was 
yet so human and lovable that, the better I knew 
him, the more sacred and attractive became the call- 
ing of the Christian minister. 

The experience that I have described proved a 
blessing to me in more ways than one. In the first 
place, I was thenceforth at peace with myself. I 
also found myself in more nearly perfect accord 
and fellowship with those with whom I was most 
closely associated. Thus undisturbed from within 
or without, I took greater pleasure in my work and 
made greater progress with it. Naturally, as the 
term neared its close, I began to beg to be allowed 
to return for the next, promising that, if I might, I 
would board myself, that is, live in a private family, 



24 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

where I could provide my own food, but have it 
cooked for me, and thus reduce my expenses con- 
siderably below the amoimt I was paying at the 
Seminary. Fortunately the young man with whom 
I began Latin, who was coming back, not only 
spoke for me, but offered to room with me, thus de- 
priving my people of their last excuse for with- 
holding their approval. I am sure I was very 
happy that term, for, when I try to visuahze my 
surroundings, I see myself in a maze of cherry trees, 
with their dehcate blossoms or their delicious fruit, 
and when I attempt to recall something that inter- 
fered with my happiness, the only thing of the kind 
that I can remember is the effect upon me of the 
useless energy I put into the only game of baseball 
in which I ever participated. I could hardly move 
without severe pain for a week. 

I spent the long vacation helping on the farm, 
and, in the fall, instead of continuing my studies, 
I took a school a few miles from home and spent 
the winter in teaching it. I was then in my nine- 
teenth year and small for my age, and the school, 
in which I had been led to expect twenty pupils, 
grew until there were forty-three, one several years 
older and several considerably larger, than I ; but I 
knew that I was qualified to teach them and that 
in the matter of discipline the Trustee would unhes- 
itatingly support me. In this confidence I put my 



GLIMPSES OF LARGER THINGS 25 

heart into my work and, taking advantage of the 
custom of "boarding aromid," I made myself so 
thoroughly at home in the commiuiity, that I had 
no serious difficulty. The Trustee was so well 
pleased that, at the end of the term, he paid me 
twenty nfive instead of twenty dollars a month for 
my services. 

Having now money of my own, I made all haste 
to resume my studies, not however at Fulton, but, 
at the suggestion of my father, at Whitestown, the 
place where he had studied, which was much more 
convenient. There I began Greek, alone, as I had 
commenced Latin, but with a teacher who was as 
thorough as he was enthusiastic. We made such 
progress that, at the end of a month, we had finished 
the paradigms and I was anticipating the pleasure 
of making the acquaintance of some Greek author, 
when, unfortunately, I was taken severely ill and 
had to go home to recuperate. 

In the fall, when I returned to Fulton, remem- 
bering my experience with Latin, I took care to 
make clear to the professor of Greek, not how long 
I had studied the language, but how far I had gone 
in it. He gave the case a little thought and, be- 
ing constitutionally lenient, surprised me by an- 
nouncing that since he had no class in the Greek 
Reader, he would put me into one that was be- 
ginning the Anabasis. Of course, I had to work 



26 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

hard at first to hold my own with the rest of the 
class; but it paid, for I not only made unexpected 
progress in Greek but I taught myself, what I 
have since repeatedly demonstrated, that the 
proper method in teaching languages is not to 
cram the beginner with grammatical material for 
which he has no use, but to allow him to read as 
soon as he can distinguish the various forms of in- 
flected words ; and learn the rules of syntax as well 
as increase his vocabulary from concrete and con- 
stantly recurring illustrations: in short, that the 
sooner and faster he can read, provided he does his 
work thoroughly as he advances, the better. 

I learned another lesson of some value the follow- 
ing term. I had expected to return to the Semin- 
ary, but, at the last moment, my father suggested 
that I spend the winter in study at home. At first 
it did not seem to me possible to make much prog- 
ress without teachers, but when he offered me the 
best room in the house for a study, with plenty of 
wood and all the books I needed, taken with the 
prospect, I yielded. The result surprised me. In 
the first place, being my own master, and not 
obliged to give any time to anything else, even re- 
citing, I made better progress than I could have 
made at school; but, better still, I learned to com- 
mand myself, to fix my mind on a given subject 
and pursue it at any length of time, a power, the pos- 



GLIMPSES OF LARGER THINGS 27 

session of which best accounts for any success I 
may have achieved in my profession. 

This was in 1865-6. The next winter I returned 
to the Seminary, and in the spring finished my 
preparation for college; but, unfortunately, I had 
worked so hard these two terms and suffered so 
much from anxiety lest, after all, I should not be 
able to go, that when, just before I graduated, it 
was decided in the affirmative, I was in no condi- 
tion to continue my studies. Thereat I was so 
completely discouraged that I actually abandoned 
the idea of completing my education, and, being 
now of age, instead of going home took a position 
as bookkeeper in a manufacturing establishment in 
Fulton. Thus in a day my plans and prospects 
were completely changed; but the suddenness and 
completeness of the change had left me no time 
for regret or suspense, and that was something for 
which to be thankful. 



AN INTERLUDE 

I kept books for about three months. At the 
end of that time my health was so much improved 
that I felt able to go home and take the village 
school. It was a large school, so large that I had 
to have an assistant; some of the older scholars 
had been my playmates; but again I put my 
heart into my work and I was more than repaid 
for the outlay. 

How completely I had readjusted myself to what 
I supposed to be the requirements of my health 
is clear from two facts, that, when I finished the 
term, I turned my salary for the winter in great 
part over to my father, to reimburse him as far as 
I could for the expense of my schooling, and that 
I proceeded at once to look for another mercantile 
position, which I found with Spencer, White and 
Co., a wholesale and retail dry goods house in 
Rome, N. Y. 

The duties of my position, although they kept 
me at my desk pretty constantly six days of the 
week, were really very light, so that I had a good 
deal of spare energy for evenings and Sundays. 
Fortunately I soon became acquainted with a num- 
ber of young men connected with the principal 

28 



AN INTERLUDE 29 

Methodist church of the city, whose pastor was a 
vigorous personality and, on occasion, a powerful 
preacher. They lost no time in introducing me to 
a larger circle, including the young ladies of the 
church, so that, from the start, I had no lack of 
good society. Moreover, since almost all of these 
young people were active in the church, it was 
not long before I myself had plenty to do. In- 
deed, as time went on, I took upon myself more 
than I ought to have undertaken. This, I find 
from a letter to my mother, was my program for 
Sunday toward the end of the year: I heard two 
sermons, led the choir, attended two prayer- 
meetings at the First Church, and conducted a 
prayer-meeting and a Sunday school at a mission 
two miles from the city. I wonder I did not col- 
lapse under such a load; but my enthusiasm, with 
now and then a little help from the doctor, car- 
ried me through. 

These rehgious activities, into which I was 
really forced, naturally attracted attention, and my 
friends, sometimes in my hearing, began to say 
that I was "cut out for a minister." I did not 
agree with them, for what I considered the best 
of reasons; namely, that from a child I had had a 
decided distaste for public speaking and used to 
bribe my teachers, when I could, to excuse me by 
writing two compositions for each declamation re- 



30 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

quired. Finally, however, there came a time when 
I felt that I must face the question whether I 
would try to preach the Gospel if I were made to 
see that it was my duty. It was in the fall of 
1868 that I came to this decision. A little later I 
wrote my father that, after finishing my year at 
Rome, I expected to prepare myself for the minis- 
try, and asked him if he would help me. My plan 
then was to go directly to the Theological School in 
iBbston; but the President, Dr. Warren, when I 
wrote to him for information, very strongly urged 
me to go to college, even if I could take but one 
course, and Professor Griffin, who happened to be 
in Rome about that time, endorsed his recommen- 
dation. I therefore decided to go to Remsen in the 
spring, spend the summer on the farm, reviewing 
the requirements for admission as far as I could in 
my spare time, and enter Wesleyan University in 
the fall. Thus, as it seemed to me, providentially, 
after wandering two years, I was brought back 
into my original course, but with a clearer vision 
of a worthier goal. 

I made many friends in Rome, some of whom 
I valued very highly. One of them was Henry 
S. Ninde, a brother of the Bishop, a many sided 
man who, when I made his acquaintance, was, by 
his efficiency, making a reputation for the politi- 
cian who held the office of Postmaster. Later he 



AN INTERLUDE 31 

went into the work of the Young Men's Christian 
Association, where he was to win a finer one for 
himself. He has not, however, been a mere secre- 
tary, but at heart a poet, embroidering with beauti- 
ful thoughts the simplest duties of his calling. It 
is a great thing to fall into the hands of such a man ; 
he sees in one so much more than one dares suspect 
in one's self. It was he who, every Sunday in the 
winter of 1868-9, led Warner, a husky brother from 
the rolling mill, and me through the mud or snow 
out to the mission at Stanwix, beguiling the way 
with such talk, that, by the time we reached our 
destination, we felt like talking and sometimes sur- 
prised ourselves at it. He helped me, I am sure, 
to face the probability of spending my life in the 
ministry. 

There was another, an older man, who, at a 
critical stage in my theological course, gave me 
the courage to make an important decision. This 
was Mr. White, of the firm whose books I was 
keeping. He was a quiet, reticent gentleman, but 
a merchant of great experience. He it was who 
bought our goods and served most of our choicest 
customers. It was a lesson to see him handle the 
cheapest fabric with his long slender fingers for the 
humblest customer. He touched it as delicately as 
if it were worth times the price he was asking, which 
was always its honest value. He was rather 



32 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

brusque with his clerks, and sometimes teased them, 
especially if he was beginning to like them. I na- 
tm-ally tried to please him, but, not understanding 
his ways, it was some time before I felt comfortable 
in his company. Indeed, I hardly knew how I 
stood with him until my year was drawing to a close, 
when he cordially favored a proposal that I stay an- 
other month, to give the books a thorough examina- 
tion, adjust the accounts of the partners, and pre- 
pare a new agreement for them. When my work 
was done and the showing proved to be decidedly in 
his favor, he did not attempt to hide his satisfaction, 
and from that time onward I was his "boy" and a 
welcome guest in his family. It was he who, sev- 
eral years later, when I was finishing my course in 
Boston and wondering whether I should go to Ger- 
many to fit myself to teach the Old Testament, set- 
tled the question for me by offering to loan me half 
the sum I needed for the purpose. 

The third of my friends who helped to make my 
year in Rome memorable was a young lady. She 
was at school most of the time, but so popular was 
she in the circle into which I had been received that, 
when she came home for her first vacation, I was 
prepared to admire her. I found her even more 
sunny and sensible than I had anticipated, and not 
prejudiced against me by the fact that I was think- 
ing of the ministry. Thenceforward it was the old 



AN INTERLUDE 33 

story. The next time she came home our regard for 
each other, kept alive by correspondence, had ri- 
pened into an attachment which neither of us took 
pains to conceal. We began to plan for our future 
life-work. Our dream of usefulness, however, was 
all too brief, for, when she graduated, she almost 
immediately went into a decline, and within a year 
she had passed to her reward; yet not until her in- 
terest and approval had given to my plans a sacred- 
ness which held me to them, although it was ten 
years before they were fulfilled. Therefore among 
Roman names I cherish with peculiar tenderness 
hers, a name which fifty years ago every one knew 
and loved as MoUie Harvey. 



IN COLLEGE 

In September 1869 I finally reached Middletown 
and, walking up High St. to a chorus of katydids, 
humbly applied for admission to Wesleyan Univer- 
sity. "Humbly," I say, because I had been more 
than two years out of school, and during the summer 
I had had very little time to refresh my memory on 
the requirements for admission. Moreover, I re- 
member that I had never taken a high mark on ex- 
aminations. I was really so uncertain whether I 
should pass the test before me that I left my trunk 
unpacked until I heard that I had passed, with a 
recommendation (which I ignored) that I review 
Latin composition. I have always believed that 
this report was based not on my papers, but, at Pro- 
fessor Griffin's suggestion, on my record at Fulton : 
and this seems to me to have been only fair under 
the circumstances. It certainly would have been 
unjust to reject or even condition me, since, al- 
though I was rusty, I had the training required for 
the work to be done and it would be a matter of only 
a few weeks before my ability would have to be ad- 
mitted. 

Wesleyan University, when I entered, was still a 

34 



IN COLLEGE 35 

comparatively small institution, but its friends had 
recently come pretty generously to its assistance, 
and it had entered upon a period of more rapid de- 
velopment. Its Faculty, also, was small; but it was 
composed of men who, although they had written 
little, and therefore were not widely known, were 
thorough scholars and, most of them, each in his 
fway, highly esteemed teachers. Besides, they were 
noble Christian gentlemen, in whose homes students 
who appreciated genuine culture were always 
kindly received. I reckon that I profited as much 
from their personal influence as I did from their 
work in the classroom. 

I was now old enough to understand the value of 
a college course, and I laid my plans to get the most 
possible out of it. I resolved : 

1. To devote myself to the regular curriculum, 
ignoring extra courses and prize contests. 

2. To give to all the required subjects my best en- 
deavor without regard to my natural preference re- 
specting either the subjects themselves or the in- 
structors by whom they were offered. 

3. To keep myself in condition to do my best 
from day to day to the end of the course. 

I also, from the start, had a definite method of 
study : 

1. I made written translations of all the Latin 
and Greek of the first year. 



36 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

2. After each recitation, while my mind was on 
the subject of it, I began the preparation of the 
next lesson on the same subject. 

3. In the case of lessons which consisted of a con- 
tinuous discussion, like history, I first went through 
them, carefully analyzing them into sections, and 
then studied them section by section, as much as pos- 
sible without the aid of the book. 

4. I made it a practice not to retire at night until 
I was prepared on all the lessons of the next day. 

5. I had a system of reviews by which, during the 
term,I prepared myself, without cramming for the 
examinations at the end. 

Naturally, at first, on account of my rustiness, I 
had to work pretty strenuously, but after a few 
weeks I foimd, not only that I was meeting any de- 
mands upon me, but meeting them more and more 
easily; also that my health, so far from suffering, 
was actually improving. I therefore came to the 
conclusion, which has often enough been verified, 
that there is nothing more healthful than regular in- 
tellectual employment. 

The matter of exercise was not so easy to manage 
as I had anticipated. At first I walked a couple of 
miles morning and evening ; but, when winter set in, 
it required so much courage at times to face the 
weather, that the game seemed hardly worth the 
candle. I was advised to go to the gymnasium; 



IN COLLEGE 37 

but, after nearly breaking my neck two or three 
times, I decided to look for a less dangerous form of 
exercise. Fortunately there later came to me a 
chance to put into practice my knowledge of gar- 
dening, and I eagerly took charge of two gardens ; 
where I found exercise in which there was not only 
health but productive service and some financial 
profit. 

The second year I was carrying my studies so 
comfortably that, on being again invited to take the 
school at Remsen, I gave the winter to this form of 
productive service. In so doing, of course, I lost 
the benefit of the training of the classroom, but, 
with the aid of the annual reviews, which were then 
a feature of the Wesleyan system, I succeeded in 
making a tolerably good showing on the subjects 
which I had missed. I did not repeat this experi- 
ence, but, having some time to spare, and wishing, 
so far as possible without injury to my proper in- 
terests to pay my own expenses, I took a place as 
tutor in a private family which I was fortunate 
enough to retain until the end of my course. It 
was desirable in more than one respect. In the first 
place, it afforded me an opportunity to gratify my 
fondness for children. I was already on familiar 
terms with those in the families of the professors 
and, as chorister in the Methodist Sunday School, 
more or less acquainted with a much larger number ; 



38 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

but the former I saw rather seldom, while the latter 
I saw only beyond arm's length. Now I was 
brought into almost daily contact with three little 
people whom I was permitted, not only to teach, but 
to love, and whose love I was also at liberty to win. 
Then, too, through the Stileses, I became a member 
of the local Shakespeare Club and thus came to 
know some of the best people of Middletown and to 
appreciate the works of our greatest English poet, 
as I probably should not have learned to do in the 
classroom ; for those were the days before Professor 
Winchester had created an English department for 
his Alma Mater. 

I hope I have not said so much of the side lines 
of thought and activity in which I was interested as 
to suggest a suspicion that I was neglecting my 
college work, for that was not the case. I was, in 
fact, as conscientious in the preparation of my daily 
lessons as I had been in my Freshman year ; but I 
had since that brought myself to a stage of training 
that enabled me to do a given amount of mental 
work in half, or less than half, the time it used to 
require, and I was simply using the surplus in ac- 
quiring some other elements of a liberal culture. I 
cannot remember that I "cut" any recitations for 
pleasure's sake more than once, and that was so 
curious a case that I may be pardoned for giving it 
a few lines. Our Sunday school was going on a 



IN COLLEGE 39 

picnic down the river. I had decided that I could 
not afford to go, but, as I had the time, I went to 
the dock to see the children off. Of course, I was 
importuned to go, but I refused — until the last 
minute. Then I suddenly began to wonder whether 
I was not becoming a slave to a system, an autom- 
aton, and, to prove that I was still a free agent, I 
deliberately went aboard the boat and had a de- 
lightful outing. But this was not the end of the 
matter. A few days later I was invited to call at 
the office of the President, who, ignoring the psy- 
chological aspect of the case and various other, as 
it seemed to me, palliating circumstances, reproved 
me as roundly as if I had been the chronic offender 

to whom he once said, "Mr. , I shall be glad 

when you graduate." I cannot to this day explain 
his severity, unless he had formed too good an opin- 
ion of me and was disappointed to find me un- 
worthy of it. But, if so, why did he never after- 
ward show any lack of confidence in me? 

I have said of the members of the Faculty that 
they were thorough scholars. I could not say that 
they were all equally esteemed as teachers, for there 
were students in my day who would not have sub- 
iScribed to such a statement. I could, however, have 
said for myself that there was not one of them of 
whom I could not speak with the sincerest respect 
and gratitude. The fact is, that the one who, be- 



4jO for the benefit OF MY CREDITORS 

cause he was not a college man and did not under- 
stand students and their traditions, was least popu- 
lar, was precisely the one whom I knew best and to 
whom I was more indebted in my preparation for 
the next stage in my education than to any of the 
others. First, he knew Boston and he told me 
enough about it to make me eager to see it. If I 
shrank from undertaking a post-graduate course, 
I had him as an example of what an earnest student 
by hook or by crook could do for himself, even with 
a handicap, in such a centre of culture. Finally, 
when I went to him with some theological questions, 
he simply told me that they would yield to time and 
thought, and I ceased to worry about them. He 
himself did his own thinking and stood by the re- 
sults of it. Of this he gave me proof when, on one 
occasion, he told me of being invited to finish a com- 
mentary, but given to understand that he would be 
expected, in his interpretation of the book in ques- 
tion, to conform to the well-known views of the 
General Editor, he replied that he always let the 
biblical authors speak for themselves and that he 
would not be a party to the violation of that prin- 
ciple. This declaration affected me like an electric 
shock. I have never recalled it without a thrill of 
admiration for the man, George Prentice, who, 
nearly fifty years ago, had the faith and courage to 
make it. 



IN COLLEGE 41 

This part of my story would be incomplete with- 
out the mention of one more man who made a deep 
and lasting impression upon me during my college 
course. It was Edward Everett Hale. He came 
to Middletown soon after I entered to deliver an 
address before one of the societies. His subject 
was "Noblesse oblige." The program was so ar- 
ranged that he had very little time to develop it, but 
in those few minutes he drove home the thought, 
that the professional man must serve for the sake 
of serving and not chaffer with the world over his 
compensation, with such force that I have never 
been able to forget it. He met me, so to speak, 
again as I was leaving college, and in his story 
Ups and Downs taught me another valuable les- 
son, namely, that one should not look for great 
tasks, but do the next thing and in doing it fit one's 
self for a better. I have found this rule the best 
guaranty of steady employment. 



A BEGINNING IN THEOLOGY 

I graduated from Wesley an University in 1873 
and entered the School of Theology of Boston Uni- 
versity in the fall of the same year. My father did 
not approve of this move; he said I already had 
training enough for the ministry; but he finally 
gave me money enough to start me on my new 
course. I reached Boston one afternoon in Sep- 
tember and almost immediately began to feel at 
home in the city. This f eehng was to some extent 
due to the fact that, as I stood outside the station, 
wondering which direction I must take to get to 
Bromfield Street, a well-dressed gentleman, who al- 
most seemed to be waiting for me, not only offered 
to direct me, but finally saw me well on my way to 
the School. I appreciated his kindness to such an 
extent, that, taking it as the proper Bostonian 
spirit, I resolved that, if I were prospered in my er- 
rand, I would cultivate it. As a matter of fact, I 
seldom, even now, see anyone in need of direction 
without being reminded of my own experience and 
prompted to follow the example of my guide of 
long ago. 

Since the School of Theology was removed from 

42 



A BEGINNING IN THEOLOGY 43 

Concord, N. H., to Boston its friends have made 
much of its site, emphasizing the facts, that it was 
a department of a University and that site of 
the University was Boston. This was shrewd ad- 
vertising, for Boston has always been a name to 
conjm^e with, especially in the West, as shown by 
the fact that, of the seventeen men in my class, 
eleven were from that part of the country. Indeed, 
the city did more than bring students from all quar- 
ters ; it helped to hold them when they had come by 
the advantages outside the Theological School 
which it offered, including opportunities to earn 
their living while they were pursuing their course. 

The importance of the supplementary educa- 
tional advantages will appear on a nearer view of 
the Theological School. Its Faculty consisted of 
men of ability and prominence in the Methodist 
Church, but there were then only four of them and 
the method of instruction did not allow them to 
make the most of themselves. This method, the 
one by written and dictated lectures, although it en- 
abled the teacher to put his ideas clearly and the 
student to get them correctly, was so slow that 
little ground was covered, especially if any time was 
taken for discussion or supplemental exercises. 
Thus, even when a certain amount of reading was 
required, which was not always the case, the work 
which the student had to do from day to day was 



44 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

really very light, so light that a man with college 
training, if he had nothing else of interest or im- 
portance with which to busy himself, could hardly 
feel that he was making much progress. Such men 
were encouraged to take elective courses in other 
departments of the University, until the method of 
instruction was modified and the theological work 
stiffened, when this privilege was correspondingly 
limited. 

I had taken Hebrew in college. I, therefore, had 
more spare time than most of my fellow students, 
but I did not, like them, go to the College of Liberal 
Arts for employment. In the first place, I pressed 
on with my Hebrew and, without a teacher, read 
during the first year the whole of the Hexateuch. 
I had planned to take Sanskrit at the College, but 
the course was postponed for a year. I was so 
disappointed that, by the advice of a hnguist whose 
acquaintance I had made, I went to work on it by 
myself and studied it as regularly and faithfully as 
if it had been a required course. These two "elec- 
tives," as I reckoned them, and a private pupil to 
whom I gave ten hours a week, gave me sufficient 
additional work, but they still left me time for the 
cultural advantages that seemed most desirable. 

It took us some time in those days to bring our- 
selves to the reasonable attitude in such matters, 
there was so much to see and hear all about us. For 



A BEGINNING IN THEOLOGY 45 

example, the windows of some of our rooms opened 
on one in the rear end of Music Hall, which was 
always open when there was a lecture or concert. 
The hall where the lectures of the Lowell Institute 
were given was just around the corner in one di- 
rection and Tremont Temple in another. In these 
places were heard the great artists, authors, orators 
and scientists of our own and other countries. 
Some of them were Boston men and women, while 
others lived so near that one might meet them any 
day in the street or on the Common, or see and hear 
them in a public meeting. But the most dehghtf ul 
occasions were those on which they came to speak 
informally to us students, especially if they were 
among the famous preachers of the city. 

There were then three very popular preachers 
in the city. The one with the largest following 
was the Rev. George C. Lorimer of Tremont Tem- 
ple. He was said to have started in life as an actor. 
At any rate, he looked like one and he had a dra- 
matic manner in the pulpit, or rather, as he strode 
back on the platform from which he delivered his 
sermons. He was a man of strong convictions, 
and he had a positiveness in expressing them which 
always found favor with earnest people. His more 
critical hearers could not always follow him, but 
they did not doubt his sincerity or question the value 
of his influence in his parish and in the community. 



46 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

The pastor of Park St. Church was a man of 
very different type. In the first place, he had a 
figure which attracted notice on the street, and, 
when he arose in church at the afternoon service 
and, pushing aside the box pulpit as if it were a 
chair, straightened himself, put his hand into the 
breast of his coat, and began his sermon, the con- 
gregation were prepared to admire, not only him, 
but anything that he had to say to them. He ap- 
proached his subject from the personal standpoint 
and clothed it with vivid and unconventional lan- 
guage. It was the kind of sermon that might be 
expected from one who boasted that he prepared 
himself for the pulpit behind a locked door, with no 
helps but the Bible and Webster's Dictionary. 
There was a certain freshness about it. Indeed, 
Mr. Murray could, and often did, present ideas 
familiar to any student of theology as if they were 
new discoveries. Those who, like the ancient 
Athenians, were on the lookout for "some new 
thing" came flocking to hear him, and the church 
was filled to the doors. The preacher was natur- 
ally flattered, but the deacons were by no means 
satisfied. "It is true," they said, "the congregation 
has grown amazingly, but the collections have not 
increased in proportion": and the preacher himself 
finally found that the people he attracted were not 



A BEGINNING IN THEOLOGY 47 

of those by whom churches were founded and 
supported. 

The third of the preachers I had in mind, Phil- 
lips Brooks, was very unlike either of the first two. 
In the first place, although he was very large, and 
that fact did not escape notice wherever he went, 
he never thought of his commanding stature as 
an element in a preacher's success. In fact, one 
cannot imagine him taking stock of such things. 
On the other hand he must sometimes have been 
painfully conscious of certain defects which would 
naturally hamper a public speaker; for he was so 
nearsighted that, it was said, he could not see his 
congregation, he had a slight impediment in ut- 
terance which forced him to speak very rapidly, 
and his throat was so sensitive in those days that he 
often finished his sermon in almost a whisper. Yet 
Huntington Hall, where he then preached, was 
always crowded, and many students were among 
his most frequent and appreciative hearers. They 
admired his sermons as sermons because they dealt 
with vital truths and problems, which he made his 
own and illustrated by f amihar experiences in real 
life. When he announced his text, and, as his habit 
was, hesitated a minute, it seemed as if he shrank 
from teUing what he thought about it, but, once 
started, he poured out his message, as if he could 



48 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

not keep it to himself, but must share its helpful, 
hopeful burden with us. When he was done we 
felt that we had looked into the heart of a saint, 
but a very human one and one whom we should 
be glad to resemble. Having often had this feel- 
ing, I was not surprised when, years later, a young 
man, now himself among the most widely known of 
American preachers, told me that he came to Bos- 
ton to study law, but after hearing Phillips Brooks 
a few times, became convinced that the greatest 
thing in the world was the Gospel, and that the 
greatest work was that of preaching it to his fellow 
men. 

The second year in a theological school, as in a 
college, is supposed to be the one that requires 
closest study, and that, therefore should bring 
greatest results. It was the most strenuous for me 
in various ways. First, I had to give more time to 
earning my expenses when I could get anything 
to do. I was fortunate enough in the beginning 
to get work in the School itself. It was the rule 
that only students who had studied Greek were 
admitted to the regular course, and only regular 
students were given free rooms in the dormitory. 
Now there were five among the newcomers who had 
thus been obliged to hire rooms outside. In their 
predicament I saw my opportunity. Going to the 
Dean, I asked him if he would admit tl^^se men into 



A BEGINNING IN THEOLOGY 49 

the dormitory at once if I agreed to put them into 
the regular course after the holidays. He said he 
would. Then I went to the students and asked 
them if they would give me what they were paying 
for their rooms, provided I got them into the 
dormitory at once and into the regular course after 
the holidays ; and they also answered in the affirma- 
tive. This three-cornered agreement having been 
concluded, the students came into the dormitory 
and I went to work to fulfil my part and incident- 
ally to prove what I had long believed, namely, that 
half the time spent in acquiring languages was 
wasted. Well, to make a long story short, I put 
these men through a thorough course in the ele- 
ments of Greek and made them read as much in 
the Gospel of Luke as their class had read during 
the term, — and they paid my expenses. 

Then came a time such as I had never before 
known, a time when, seek where I would, I could 
find nothing by which I could earn a livelihood. 
I prayed as never before for help, but there was no 
answer. Finally I appealed to my father, but not 
until anxiety had brought me to the verge of nerv- 
ous prostration, and I had gotten permission by 
doing double work to finish my course at the end 
of this second year. I finished my course as I had 
planned, but I did not graduate, for, when I least 
expected help, I secured a position as private secre- 



50 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

tary to the Director of the New England Con- 
servatory of Music, which made it possible for me, 
not only to finish my course without further anxi- 
ety about my finances, but, by the indulgence of 
the Faculty, to remain a third year and pursue a 
line of independent work. 

The duties of my new position took four of the 
best hours of every day, but they did not pre- 
vent me from doing justice to my studies. That 
which I enjoyed most was systematic theology. 
It interested me because, as I have intimated, 
while in college, I had become more or less 
disturbed about the soundness of some of the theo- 
logical views which I had inherited, and here was an 
opportunity, under capable guidance, to examine 
and, if necessary, correct them. I use the word 
^'capable" advisedly, for I suppose that Dean 
Latimer, in whose province they belonged, was as 
competent to instruct me with reference to them as 
anyone in the Methodist Church. He had already 
won a reputation as a keen and careful thinker. 
He was also a deeply religious man and, there- 
fore, not liable to allow theology to usurp the place 
of religion. Finally, he was remarkably tolerant, 
believing that the cause of truth could best be 
served by the freest interchange of opinion ; and he 
conducted his classes on this principle. On one oc- 
casion, for example, when doubt was expressed 



A BEGINNING IN THEOLOGY 51 

with reference to his interpretation of a certain 
doctrine, he permitted a discussion which lasted 
several days, with the most satisfactory results. I 
was so impressed by it that to this day, whenever 
I think of the good Dean, I see him as he sat smil- 
ingly ordering that memorable debate. I might 
add incidentally that on this occasion I held with 
the chair, while the leader of the opposition was a 
man who has long enjoyed the highest honor con- 
ferred by our Church. 

I missed much, I have no doubt, by the irregu- 
larity of my course, for I never had any classwork 
in the Old Testament, and I had to prepare myself 
for the examinations for the whole of the third year 
with borrowed notebooks. I made good these 
losses as far as I could by private study. Thus, 
I gave a certain length of time every day to He- 
brew, so much that, by the end of this second year, 
I must have read about two-thirds of the Old Tes- 
tament in that language. 

I think I did not change my plans and decide to 
teach instead of preaching this year ; but I did very 
soon after returning to Boston for the third, when I 
devoted all my time not given to Dr. Tourgee to 
the study of the Bible in the original. I came to 
the decision suddenly and in connection with a very 
trifling incident. I was standing one evening at 
the street door hesitating about taking my con- 



52 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

stitutional in the rain, when someone came down 
the stairs, laid his hand on my shoulder, and said, 
"Mitchell, how would you like to be a professor of 
theology?" I turned to see who it was who had 
spoken and found myself face to face with a mem- 
ber of the Faculty. He passed on without waiting 
for a reply or ever again referring to the matter; 
but from that moment it was as if I had been 
divinely called to the study and interpretation of 
the Scriptures. 

I say "Scriptures," for, as I have intimated, I 
was then dividing my time mostly between the 
testaments, and there was nothing to my call to 
indicate which was to be my specialty. I was not, 
however, long in deciding between them. I chose 
the Old Testament, not because I was less fond 
of Greek than Hebrew, — the contrary was actually 
the case, — but because, at the time, I knew only 
one Methodist who could be called a Hebrew 
scholar, and he was so far advanced in years that, 
unless someone soon came forward, our Church 
would be left without a representative in that field. 
Moreover, I saw that the interest in the Old Testa- 
ment shown in Europe was spreading to America, 
and I wanted to have a hand in the movement. 

When I had come to this decision I lost no time 
in laying the whole matter before Dean Latimer, 
who had already been helpful to me on more than 



A BEGINNING IN THEOLOGY 53 

one occasion. He not only approved my new de- 
parture, but encouraged me to hope that, when I 
had completed my training, there would somewhere 
be a place for me as a teacher. 

I could not yet see how I should be able to go to 
Germany, but, I was so confident in my hopes, that 
I proceeded as if the funds were already provided ; 
not only pushing on with renewed zeal in Hebrew 
and the Old Testament, but, for comparative pur- 
poses, beginning Arabic, without help, except in 
the pronunciation from a printer who had worked 
at the American plant in Beirut. I also put some 
time on Armaic, that I might read the parts of 
Daniel and Ezra in that language and thus finish 
the Old Testament, which I did before the end of 
the year. 

This last year was a delightful one, not only be- 
cause I could study what I would, and as intensely 
as I would, but because, meanwhile, at the Con- 
servatory, I was in constant contact with one of 
the most inspiring men it was ever my fortune to 
know. At first my work was mainly with his cor- 
respondence and the programs, etc. of the institu- 
tion; but, as we became better acquainted, since, 
although he thought clearly, he found difficulty in 
putting his ideas in writing, he more and more 
relied on me to formulate them for him. Some- 
times, when we were at work at his desk, he would 



54 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

suddenly say, *'Come, Mitchell," and take me to 
his private room, where he would talk to me by the 
half hour on some musical topic. If he had in 
mind an article, I took notes; otherwise he was 
content to have me, as a layman, listen intelligently. 
One of the subjects nearest his heart was congrega- 
tional singing, which he regarded as an essential 
part of a religious service, and constantly by 
articles and lectures recommended to the churches. 
His ideal, however, was a threefold combination 
such as he had organized at Music Hall for Mr. 
Murray, consisting of a quartet and a chorus of 
two hundred, backed by a congregation of three 
thousand, an oratorio in the grandest sense. When 
these all under his inspiring direction, lifted up 
their voices, the great building was shaken and 
some of the singers were almost overcome by the 
tremendous ensemble. 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 

I have already recited how, when I was prepar- 
ing to go abroad without knowing how I should 
pay my expenses, my faith was rewarded and the 
problem solved for me. That was in the spring 
of 1876. In June I left Boston and, on the Fourth 
of July, after a few days at the Exposition in 
Philadelphia, sailed from New York for Liver- 
pool. On the voyage, made in an old liner, I was 
as miserable, it seemed to me, as one could be and 
live. Indeed, there were some of the passengers 
who, as they saw me lying on deck wrapped in my 
ulster, doubted whether I would ever see land. 
Fortunately among them was the Shakespearean 
scholar, W. J. Rolfe, who took an active interest 
in my condition and did what he could to make me 
comfortable. I got little help from the stewards, 
one of whom was so dense or so cruel that, when 
I complained of the vile odor in my stateroom, 
after considering the matter, explained that a lady 
who used great quantities of cologne had occupied 
the room on the voyage to America and that this 
lingering perfume was probably what I was 
smelling. 

55 



56 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

I got my first impressions of England as we lay 
at anchor off the mouth of the Mersey, enjoying a 
perfect sunset and the long, soft twilight that fol- 
lowed. The next three days brought a series of 
unforgetable experiences: for Dr. Rolfe took me 
into his party and gave me the benefit of his famili- 
arity with the country we visited and its associa- 
tions. On the first we went to Chester and, after 
dining at Blossoms, spent the afternoon admiring 
the quaint city, leaving only in time to reach Strat- 
ford by the last train. 

The next day was Sunday, — and such a Sunday ! 
I spent the early morning alone in the churchyard, 
enjoying its restfulness and the sunlit landscape 
across the Avon. Later we all went to church 
and, after the usual service, knelt over the tomb 
of Shakespeare to partake of the communion. 
After dinner we saw Shakespeare's house and in 
the evening strolled by the footpath through the 
fields to Ann Hathaway's cottage. 

On Monday morning we took a carriage and 
pair and drove across the country, "the heart of 
England," to Warwick, where, after seeing the 
castle, I parted from my companions to go for a 
few days to London and thence to the Continent. 

I did not go direct to the University — (I knew 
that it was about to close for the summer) — but to 
Braunsghweig, where I had been told that the best 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 67 

German was spoken. I had no sooner reached 
the city than I realized the need of giving the 
language further study; for, although I had given 
a year to it in college and attended a German 
church for some time in Boston, I found my vocabu- 
lary of every-day words so limited that I could not 
engage a room without an interpreter. Fortu- 
nately the agent at the station knew English, also 
a family in which, with his help, I was soon comfort- 
ably quartered, just outside the old city. 

I next called on a lady who had been recom- 
mended to me as a teacher ; but I found her terms 
too high for my limited ability. At this juncture 
it occurred to me that, like Dr. Hale's Children 
of the Public^ I was surrounded by people who 
would be only too glad to help me if I knew how 
to secure their services. I resolved to begin with 
the family in which I was living, which consisted 
of a cellist at the theatre, his wife, and four chil- 
dren between five and fifteen. Frau Plock proved 
wonderfully helpful. She was always ready to 
hsten to my stammering tongue and always able 
to catch my meaning before anyone else got an 
inkling of it. Moreover, she had a sweet voice and 
spoke so slowly and clearly that, looking into her 
motherly face, aglow with kindness, I caught her 
meaning when no one else could make me under- 
stand. Then, there were the children, especially 



58 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

the third, a boy of six or seven, and the fourth, a 
dainty little lady of four or five. What delightful 
walks and romps and games we had! while they 
never suspected that they were teaching me, and 
I almost forgot that I was taking lessons. 

As I grew more fluent in the language I ventured 
farther and farther from the family circle. I had 
to go into the city for my dinner. On leaving the 
restaurant I sometimes strolled about, going into a 
shop or two and inquiring for something that I 
was pretty sure not to find in such a place. Natur- 
ally more or less conversation followed. If, in the 
course of it, I took occasion to remark that I was 
an American, it could be indefinitely prolonged; 
for at that time Americans were popular in Ger- 
many and the people were eager for information 
about our country. Now and then I wandered 
beyond the limits of the city, stopping, whenever 
I came upon a farmer, to chat with him about his 
crops or anything else in which I found him inter- 
ested. On Sunday I went to church to hear a 
preacher who spoke particularly intelligible Ger- 
man, and once during the week I played ninepins 
with a club of which my friend at the station was 
a member. All these people, young and old, were 
my teachers, and they helped me greatly, but I 
should not have profited as much as I did if I had 
depended entirely on them for instruction. I 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 59 

spent the whole forenoon of every day except Sun- 
day, first, in reviewing what I had learned in col- 
lege, and then in a thorough study of a comprehen- 
sive granunar in German, with rapid reading in 
any book or paper that came within my reach. The 
result was, that, at the end of ten or eleven weeks, 
when I proceeded to Leipzig, I was able to under- 
stand all that was said to me and speak so well 
that I was more than once taken for a German. 
I had a little difficulty at first in taking lectures, 
but, by condensing into English and inserting the 
German words when I could, I soon became able to 
get the whole in the original. 

There were many Americans in Leipzig in 1876. 
The greater number were at the Conservatory, 
but there was a noticeable sprinkling of them in the 
various departments of the University. The great 
lights in theology at that time were Delitzsch in 
the Old Testament, Luthardt in the New, and 
Kahnis in Dogmatics. Among their hearers were 
some English, Scotch and Irish, as well as Ameri- 
can students. These three were as unlike as pos- 
sible, in appearance as well as in their habits and 
methods. Professor Delitzsch was noticeably small 
of stature, little, if any over five feet in height ; but 
he carried his head so well that, standing by himself, 
he looked taller. He wore a coat of a fashion, too, 
that added to his apparent height. He was very 



60 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

fond of flowers, and often brought one with him, to 
enjoy its odor in the pauses of dictation. He was 
of a poetic temperament and a moderate hberal 
on the subject of the Scriptures. When I became 
acquainted with him he still clung to what was 
called the Supplementary Theory, teaching that 
the author of the basal element in the Hexateuch 
wrote in the Mosaic period, the Supplementer in 
that of Joshua or the Judges; but later he recon- 
sidered the subject and adopted the Documentary 
Hypothesis. He was so genial and generous that 
he was a great favorite with the English-speaking 
students, who formed a kind of club to which he 
talked theology regularly every fortnight. 

Professor Luthardt was tall and well built, with 
a graceful, dignified carriage. He was also a fine 
speaker. Indeed, some of the Americans went to 
hear him, not because they were interested in the- 
ology, but because they could understand him be- 
fore they could any of his colleagues and it was a 
pleasure to listen to him, even if they did not know 
what he was saying. 

Professor Kahnis was of lowly origin, and he 
showed it. He was heavily built, awkward in his 
bearing, and decidedly Saxon in his language. 
When he was lecturing he usually moved about 
uneasily, with a bunch of keys in his hands, some- 
times backing against the blackboard and bringing 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 61 

away an impression of whatever was written there 
on his coat. The students liked him, as he was so 
earnest and forceful, reminding one of Luther. 
Perhaps their interest in him was increased by the 
story current to the effect that his wife belonged 
to ,a noble family, the head of which refused to con^ 
sent to the marriage until the presumptuous suitor, 
for her sake, had won recognition as a scholar. 

I have abeady registered my objections to the 
German method as applied in the School of Theo- 
ology of Boston University. I found it even more 
objectionable as employed by its originators. The 
German professor sometimes dictated his lecture 
and the student took as much of it as he could ; but 
the latter was not required to be regular in atten- 
dance, or to pass a test on his notes unless and 
until he asked for a diploma. He could, there- 
fore, and often did, neglect the lectures, except 
at the beginning and the end of the semester, and 
borrow^ or buy those taken by others when he 
needed them. Naturally he was liable to lose 
interest in his coiu-se and forego a diploma, or fail 
if he tried to pass an examination. I used to 
wonder what percentage of the students at Leipzig 
took a degree or passed any other test for which 
they professed to be studying. Certainly not so 
many as in an American institution, with its un- 
remitting control, would take their diplomas. 



62 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

When I matriculated at Leipzig I did not expect 
to take a degree; I did not hope to^stiiy long 
enough for that purpose ; but I did expect, in the 
two years for which I had made provision, to fit my- 
self to teach the Old Testament in a reputable 
American institution, and I set to work in earnest 
to realize this expectation. To this end I took all 
the courses given by Professor Delitzsch and any 
others in the same line that promised helpfulness. 
The rest of my time I gave to Hebrew and the 
cognate languages. 

When I first entered the University, of course, 
I felt somewhat awkward and helpless ; but I soon 
became wonted, and thereafter I carried the work 
that I had undertaken without difficulty. After 
a while, as in college, I found that I had time to 
spare for outside things. I first made myself ac- 
quainted with the city and its surroundings, with 
their historical associations and monuments. 
When the season for such excursions closed I went 
regularly to concerts or the opera, feeling that I 
owed it to myself to cultivate a taste for music and 
that I should never have a better opportunity than 
this famous musical center was offering. And for 
so little ! Why, as a student I could hear an opera, 
not very comfortably, to be sure, but I could hear 
one, for the ridiculous sum, in American money 
of eighteen cents! and I did hear the greatest of 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 63 

them at that price. I felt it my duty, too, to learn 
something about the arts of painting and sculpture, 
and, not being satisfied with what I found in the 
local museum, I made pilgrimages in the vacations 
to Berlin and Dresden to see their great collections. 

It was a fruitful year, that first one in Leipzig. 
But the intellectual and aesthetical advantages I 
then enjoyed are not all for which I look back to 
it with gratitude. I have yet to confess my in- 
debtedness to the American, or, as perhaps I ought 
to say, English-speaking colony. Most prominent 
was the Rev., afterward Prof. Samuel Ives Curtiss, 
who maintained two weekly rehgious services in 
Leipzig, and who, with his noble wife, made us 
welcome on Monday evenings in his delightful 
home. There one met young men and women from 
all parts of the United States and the British Em- 
pire, including many earnest, but modest souls, 
who long since reached prominence in the callings 
for which they were then eagerly preparing. With 
some of these I formed friendships that supplied 
the sympathy and encouragement which the student 
in a strange land deeply appreciates. I therefore 
find a peculiar pleasure in reading their names and 
the record of their success in "Who's Who in 
America." 

I spent the long vacation of 1877 partly in the 
country. I remember with most pleasure a walk- 



g4, FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

ing trip in a party of six through Thuringia. We 
started from Rudolstadt and traveled leisurely by 
way of Ilmenau and Ruhle to Eisenach, where we 
spent several days. Then two of us returned by 
way of Erfurt, Gotha, and Weimar to Leipzig, 
making the distance to Weimar on foot, and the 
rest of it by rail, fourth class, with the market 
women. It was delightfully invigorating to travel 
on foot over the perfect roads mile on mile through 
fragrant spruce plantations, and very restful to 
sleep at the little inns in the villages where we 
spent our nights. When we reached Eisenach 
everything spoke of Luther; so, also, in Erfurt, 
while at Weimar Goethe and Schiller claimed our 
thoughts and commanded our admiration. What 
wonder that, when we reached Leipzig again, we 
were full of reverence for the land that had given 
these men birth, and congratulated ourselves that 
we were permitted to remain yet a while in it. 

My program for my second year was much the 
same as for the first, except that I added to the 
languages thus far piwsued Syriac and Assyrian. 
I had not, however, gone far in the subjects chosen 
before my course was suddenly interrupted and I 
found myself transformed from a student of the- 
ology into the advance agent of a concert company. 
It came about in this way. The Jubilee Singers of 
risk University, Nashville, after successful tours 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 65 

in England and Holland, had come to Germany, 
intending to spend another year on the Continent. 
They made a beginning in Berlin, where they sang 
before the Emperor. Then they came to Leipzig. 
While there, the President of their university, who 
was with them, let it be known that he had failed to 
find a German who dared undertake the task of 
arranging five concerts a week in different places 
by the season, at the same time inquiring if there 
Was an American in Leipzig who could meet these 
requirements. To my astonishment I was recom- 
mended and the position was offered me. At first 
I could not think of taking it. I was very loth to 
leave my studies. Besides, I was averse to travel- 
ing and entirely without experience of the kind I 
thought necessary to ensure success. My friends, 
however, advised me to accept, reminding me that 
I needed a change and suggesting that, if I would, 
the salary offered would enable me to stay a third 
year in Germany and take a degree. The latter 
of these considerations had such weight with me 
that I yielded and on the first of December began 
my new and strange duties. 

I think that, if I had realized what was required 
by this imdertaking, I should have been afraid of it. 
The fact is, I have often wondered how I managed 
to avoid a serious failure. I had to travel con- 
stantly, usually rising in one place, spending the 



66 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

afternoon in a second, and sleeping in a third, thus 
in five months reaching most of the important 
centres from Hamburg to Geneva. During this 
time I arranged five concerts a week, a hundred in 
all, personally taking out the permits by the police,, 
hiring the halls for the concerts, engaging the 
agents who sold the tickets, seeing the editors of 
the local papers about the advertisements and the 
editorial notices, engaging accommodations for the 
company in the hotels, visiting the musicians, the 
clergymen, and any other prominent persons who 
would naturally be interested in the concerts or 
the object for which they were given, and finally 
re-visiting each of the places where concerts had 
been arranged, to see if anything further could be 
done to make them successful ; in short doing every- 
thing that was to be done except giving the con- 
certs and paying the bills. 

Such was my work. The difficulties in the way 
of success, in their variety and seriousness, can 
hardly be imagined by anyone who has not had 
them to meet. At first, of course, I stumbled 
pretty frequently in my use of the German lan- 
guage; but this was not so serious as the inability 
of most of the Germans to understand who the 
Singers were and what was their real object. Once 
we narrowly escaped trouble through the stupidity 
of an editor who ought to have known better. I 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 67 

went to him, after having secured the use of a fine 
old church for the concert, and asked him to help 
us. "Of course I will," he promptly responded; 
"I've been in America, and I'll see that the church 
is crowded." He did, but by first representing the 
Singers as negro minstrels, and when, on my second 
visit, I showed him his error, publishing an explana- 
tion and endorsement of their actual mission that 
aroused universal interest. The audience, there- 
fore, was large and very appreciative ; but it was a 
German audience, and it did not occur to anyone, 
so far as I know, to allow himself to be moved, as 
not only Americans, but many in England and 
Holland had been, to do more than pay a very low 
admission fee for the education of the negro. In 
this case the audience was a popular one. Some- 
times it was impossible to bring all classes together 
at any given place. In such cases the receipts were 
correspondingly limited. Thus, ini Dresden the 
concert hardly paid expenses, because the king of 
Saxony, who condescended to attend it, would 
not appear except at a little hall in a hotel patro- 
nized by the nobility. Similarly in Prague "the 
proper place was so small that the prices for tickets 
had to be put above the reach of "the public." 
Finally, although the Singers did not lose money, 
as most traveling companies did that winter, their 
success was restricted and their tour considerably 



68 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

shortened on account of the strained relations be- 
tween Germany and Russia and the general opin- 
ion that war was imminent. At the end of my fifth 
month, therefore, I closed my labors at Basel, and, 
in spite of the strenuous life I had lived, returned 
to Leipzig, in the most nearly perfect health I had 
ever enjoyed, to resume my studies. 

I remember Basel especially, not only because 
there my engagement came to an end, but because 
it was the only place where I had the slightest diffi- 
culty with authorities. I arrived there the second 
time on a Saturday evening, and, after registering 
at the office of the hotel where I stopped, went to 
my room to read the letters that had been forwarded 
while I was elsewhere in Switzerland. I had 
hardly begun to open them when there was a rap 
and a man rather unceremoniously entered and 
commenced to ask questions. I did not pay much 
attention to him at first, but I finally inquired what 
right he had to quiz me as he was doing; where- 
upon he threw back his coat, disclosing the badge of 
an officer, and explained that a forgery had been 
committed in Hamburg, that the forger, whose 
name was Mischel, had escaped to Switzerland, and 
finally, that the description of the fugitive fitted 
me so well that he was obliged to request me to 
come to a police station for an examination. I pro- 
tested, of course, and showed my passport as well 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 69 

as several letters, to prove that I was an American; 
but all in vain. In fact, he advised me in substance 
"tell it to the marines." There being nothing else 
to do, — it was now after nine in the evening, — ^I 
went with him, and, as there was no one at the 
nearest station, or at headquarters, to examine me, 
I was obliged to accept the hospitality of the city 
and go to bed, — a bag of straw and a horse blanket, 
— without my supper. It was not a pleasant ex- 
perience, but my sense of humor sustained me, and 
when, in the morning, on being arraigned, I was 
identified by one of the most prominent men in the 
city, I rather enjoyed the eagerness with which the 
authorities sought to propitiate me, and their con- 
fusion when I informed them that I proposed to 
lay the matter before the American consul. I 
think I could then have gotten damages, if I had 
shown myself inclined to consider a financial offer : 
what I got through the consul and American min- 
ister was an elaborate apology from the Swiss 
government. 

I had no sooner turned my face toward Leipzig 
than I began to plan what I should do about my 
studies. Since the spring semester was already well 
advanced, I felt that it would hardly pay to try 
to overtake the lecturers whom I wished to hear, 
but I did not on that accoimt intend to let any of 
my time run to waste. Therefore, having learned 



70 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

to set myself to work, on the next day after my 
arrival I began to collect material for my disserta- 
'tion. JNIy subject, suggested by Professor De- 
litzsch, was Final Constructions of Biblical He- 
brew. It required, first, a careful reading of al- 
most the whole of the Old Testament in the orig- 
inal, a thorough examination of every passage in 
which the idea of purpose in any of its varieties 
was discoverable, and the arrangement of the ex- 
amples discovered according to the phases of the 
subject which they severally represented. This 
task was neither an easy one nor one to be finished 
in a hurry ; but, being in the best of health, I did not 
shrink from giving to it my utmost ability and all 
the time that thorough treatment of it might make 
necessary. In the end I worked at it eight hours 
a day, six days a week, until the first of October, or 
just six months, to bring it to completion. 

There are doubtless those who would think it 
hardly worth while to give so much time and effort 
to such a subject as I had chosen. I have never 
regi-etted the outlay, because, for one thing, I 
thereby reached results, positive and convincing, 
by which the Old Testament was made more intel- 
ligible and interesting. ]Moreover, as indirect re- 
sults, I had acquired, not only increased familiarity 
with the Hebrew language, but considerable ex- 
perience in methods of research and a degree of 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 71 

independence in judgment; in other words, I had 
given myself a course of training for scholarly work 
which was of more practical value to me than all the 
lectures I had heard at the University. 

My dissertation finished, I proceeded with the 
more direct preparation for taking a doctorate. 
First, since I knew that it would be some time, at 
the shortest, before the process could be completed, 
I resumed attendance upon lectures, choosing such 
as would be most helpful to me in my oral examina- 
tion on Hebrew and Syriac, my major subjects, 
and Italian painting. At the proper time I pre- 
sented my dissertation, but not before I had shown 
it to Professor Delitzsch, and then with some diffi- 
dence, because he objected to one point that I had 
made, and, when I insisted on it, warned me that 
my stubbornness would cost me my diploma. Not 
many German professors would have forgiven such 
a manifestation of American independence, but he 
probably changed his mind after a more critical 
reading. At any rate, not only was my woi^k 
passed, but the sub-committee, who conducted the 
oral examination complimented me on its excel- 
lence. I suspect that it was the dissertation which 
got me my degree, for, as usual, I did not cram for 
the examination, and, to make matters worse, my 
landlady, in the goodness of her heart, gave me an 
unusually good dinner just before I went to meet 



72 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

the committee, — with the usual effect on cerebra- 
tion. I shall therefore always recall with appre- 
ciation the considerate as well as tactful way in 
which the chairman announced the result: "Mr. 
Mitchell, we congratulate you on having won your 
degree, as was to be expected from the character of 
your dissertation." 

I got my degree in March, but, owing to the re- 
quirement that a doctor's dissertation, or a part of 
it, be published, I had to stay in Leipzig and 
struggle with my printer, who not only knew no 
English, and therefore made as many mistakes as 
possible, but had absolutely no idea of the value of 
time, and could not be induced to hurry. It was 
therefore May when I left for home and about the 
first of June when I reached America. 

It was naturally a source of great satisfaction to 
me, that, when I returned, I brought with me a di- 
ploma from a famous university. It meant that I 
had won recognition as a possible scholar and that, 
other things being equal, I might look forward to 
a fairly successful career as a teacher. This, how- 
ever, I must now confess, was not my only warrant 
for recalling the recent past with satisfaction and 
facing the future with cheerful confidence. In the 
fall of 1878, among the newcomers in Leipzig was 
an American lady in whom I at once became inter- 
ested. I noted the simple black of her costume 



A STUDENT IN GERMANY 73 

and thought I saw a shade of sadness in her expres- 
sion. I met her often during the winter and 
always with growing admiration tinged with sym- 
pathy. The better I knew her the more I enjoyed 
seeing her happy. I told a friend that I was going 
to banish the suggestion of sadness from her face. 
He warned me that it was a risky undertaking, but 
not being in a position to ask any woman to share 
my fortunes, and not, in my own opinion, having 
the qualities that would commend me, except as a 
friend, to the one in question, I could hardly beheve 
that there was any danger. Thus we became 
friends, and, after a delightful holiday trip with 
several others to BerHn and Dresden, intimate 
friends. We did not, I think, know how much we 
had become to each other until the time drew near 
for me to leave her and return to America. Then, 
as I was trying to tell her how much I should miss 
her I learned to my sm^prise that in my eager 
efforts to make her happy, I had unwittingly won 
the high privilege of doing the same, if I could, for 
the rest of our mutual lives. From that moment > 
of course, life took on a new and larger meaning. 
While I remained in Leipzig she shared all my 
thoughts and plans, and, when I came home, I 
came to find a place where I could serve God with 
the woman he had given me. 



MY FIRST AND ONLY PARISH 

At the end of the biographical sketch appended 
to my dissertation I said: "I intend to return at 
once to America and place myself at the disposal 
of the Methodist Church, of which I am a member." 
When I reached home, knowing that there was as 
yet no opening for me in Boston, I began to look 
for some other position in which I could serve God 
and Methodism; but I looked in vain. Finally it 
occurred to me that perhaps I had mistaken the di- 
vine will and that after all I should not have gone 
into the ministry. To make full proof of my will- 
ingness to do my duty, whatever it might be, I 
offered myself to the Missionary Society. I was 
accepted and appointed to Japan; but when one of 
the Secretaries, on meeting me, learned how much 
time I had spent in preparation for educational 
work, he said that, as the position for which I was 
fitted had just been filled, it would be better for me 
to withdraw my application. I took his advice, but, 
although I never saw the foreign field, I have al- 
ways felt that my experience as a candidate for it 
gave me a right to reckon myself a returned mis- 
sionary. 

74 



MY FIRST AND ONLY PARISH 75 

As soon as I found myself again free to plan for 
myself I decided that, if in the meantime I found 
no place to teach, I would join the first fall con- 
ference that would take me and enter the regular 
ministry. I had not waited long before I saw a 
notice giving the date on which the Central New 
York Conference was to assemble. I wrote to the 
Presiding Elder by whom it was signed, asking him 
if he had a place for a man of my description in his 
district. He replied that his district was full and 
that he doubted if any men would be received into 
the Conference at the coming session. This was 
discouraging, but, in spite of the unfavorableness 
of the outlook, when the time came I went to Cort- 
land, where the session was to be held, and applied 
for work. 

I shall never forget that session. The President 
was Bishop Bowman. I was deeply impressed by 
his devout manner, the ability and earnestness of 
the members, and the importance of the interests 
that were discussed. In the end, especially as little 
attention was paid to me, except by a few of the 
older members whom I happened to know, I became 
so humble that I was willing to take either of two 
or three unimportant places that were mentioned as 
possibilities. 

It was in this spirit that I took my seat on the 
morning when the appointments were to be read. 



76 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

There was a solemn hush as the Bishop appeared 
on the platform and asked one of the preachers to 
conduct the devotions. This introductory service 
seemed to me so impressive that I was rather sur- 
prised to see the Bishop on his knees take a pencil 
from his pocket and make some change in the list 
he had brought with him; but, when he finally be- 
gan to read the appointments, I forgot this little 
incident in my anxiety to learn whether I had 
one. When he read my name, I was curious 
to laiow where the place to which I had been 
iassigned, but of which I had never heard, was 
situated. My curiosity, however, was accompanied 
by an eager responsiveness to the authority of the 
Bishop. It was therefore with amazement, not to 
say consternation, that, when the Bishop had fin- 
ished, I listened to one of the leading members of 
the Conference as, rising in his place, he said with 
white lips and a tense voice, "Bishop, I can't go 
to Auburn," for it seemed to me nothing short of 
defiance of the Almighty, and I almost expected 
to see the man smitten hke Ananias. 

The name of the place to which I had been ap- 
pointed was Bearytown. When I made inquiry one 
of the preachers informed me that it lay between 
Cayuga and Seneca Lakes, and, as he was going in 
that direction, invited me to spend the night with 
him and finish my journey in the morning. I ac- 



MY FIRST AND ONLY PARISH 77 

cepted his hospitaKty and found his home and his 
conversation so restful that, when morning came, 
I was prepared to meet my people with a good de- 
gree of calmness and courage. 

I stayed only ten months at Bearytown, or Fay- 
ette, as the postal authorities preferred to call it; 
but I look back upon those ten months as a period 
among the happiest in my entire experience, and 
that in spite of what one would naturally call the 
most unfavorable circumstances. If I had been 
looking for congenial conditions I certainly should 
not have asked to be sent to one of the smallest, 
if not the smallest, charge in the Conference, 
among a people almost entirely (Pennsylvania) 
German farmers, to work under an Elder who 
boasted of his lack of theological training, at a sal- 
ary that barely supported me and, therefore, for- 
bade matrimonial designs. Still, I was happy, 
very happy, because I was more completely conse- 
crated to the service of God than I had ever before 
been in my life. In this spirit I worked forenoons 
at my sermons, two a week, and in this spirit I went 
on foot every afternoon in search of opportunities 
in one way or another to help those under my care. 
It is no exaggeration to say that it was "my meat 
and my drink" thus to exercise my ministry. One 
evening, for example, returning from a visit to a 
poor outcast who lived near the village, I was in so 



78 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

exalted a frame of mind, that I said to a rather dis- 
reputable fellow on the road, "Charlie, if you want 
to be happy, be a Methodist minister." 

My sermons cost me a deal of honest work. I 
should have preferred to write them both, but from 
the first I saw that this was impossible. I also dis- 
covered on the first Sunday evening, that, with 
the help of brief notes, I could speak half an hour 
on a subject to which I had not given any study. I 
therefore decided to give five mornings of the week 
to a written sermon for the morning service and the 
sixth to an outline of that for the evening. I might 
have saved myself some of the work which this plan 
required, for, to my surprise, I soon found that it 
was easier for me to extemporize than to read from 
a complete manuscript ; also that most of my people 
preferred the former method, because as they 
acutely said, it brought us eye to eye with one an- 
other. I resisted the temptation to change because 
I felt that I must be true to my training, also con- 
sider the two or three who would judge me by the 
amount they found in my sermons. One of them 
was a man, himself once a preacher, who had lost 
his standing in the Church, but retained his interest 
in clerical matters, especially sermons. He used to 
drop in after service on Sunday evenings and dis- 
cuss mine with me while I ate my supper. 

I did not at first see much fruit from my labors, 



MY FIRST AND ONLY PARISH 79 

either as a preacher or a pastor. The reason was 
that, the preceding year, under a young evangelist, 
there had been a prolonged series of meetings in 
which many, including almost all the young people 
of the place, had been persuaded to begin the Chris- 
tian life. I, of course, had those who joined our 
Church to care for, and I did my best to keep them 
in the way; but for some time I could not add to 
the number. Finally I discovered that there were 
a few persons in the community who, for one reason 
or another, were considered hopeless cases, and had 
been neglected by the evangelist. I was advised 
not to waste my time on them, but, remembering 
Jesus' interest in publicans and sinners, I went to 
them with my message. To my surprise, instead 
of repulsing me, they heard me gladly, and it was 
not long before several of them joined the Church, 
and those who did not took a friendly attitude to- 
ward me as its minister. One of the latter, who 
was by some called an infidel, but was really only 
a Universalist, became one of my staunchest friends 
and stood by me in an endeavor to rid the commu- 
nity of a bar better than some of my members. 

This incident among many taught me that there 
was a work to do among my own people the neces- 
sity and importance of which they hardly realized. 
They had, as I have stated, just passed through a 
revival from which perhaps half of them dated their 



80 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

religious life. They attended the regular meetings 
and cheerfully took part in the usual Methodist 
manner. The young people had an additional 
meeting, where they felt freer to give vent to their 
emotions than among their elders. Sometimes 
there was more or less excitement; but being, from 
a boy, perfectly famihar with such manifestations, 
they did not offend me, and I did not attempt to 
check them. I could not, however, allow anyone as 
sincere as most of these young people were to har- 
bor so crude notions of religion as they sometimes 
expressed without trying to help him understand 
his experience. When, therefore, I found that 
some of them thought the tingling at the ends of 
their fingers betokened the presence of the Divine 
Spirit, I took the first opportunity to suggest that 
love, joy, and peace, etc. were more reliable indica- 
tions; and I took especial pains to advise those in 
whom these fruits actually showed themselves not 
to worry if their nerves were not noticeably af- 
fected. 

My own early experience naturally made me 
sympathetic with young people who were ambitious 
to get an education, and I was only too happy to 
help them. I offered them the use of my books, 
some of which, as there was no library in the village, 
I thought they would be eager to read. One young 
man came regularly to read in my study, thus giv- 



MY FIRST AND ONLY PARISH 81 

ing me an opportunity to become acquainted with 
him. Another, who was planning to go to college, 
but was obhged to miss a term at school, I helped 
in his studies, that he might not be delayed in his 
preparation. I have often congratulated myself 
that I had a hand in his education, for he not only 
did himself credit in college, but he has since had 
a successful career as a teacher in one of our largest 
universities. 

I have already told how completely, when I went 
to Fayette, I renounced my previous desires and 
ambitions and how happy I was in the performance 
of my ministerial duties. I continued more than 
content while I was busy, but, when spring came 
and the farmers became more and more occupied 
with their crops, with less and less time for the 
Church ; when, moreover, I had learned to do what 
I had to do more easily, I could hardly help think- 
ing of my personal condition and interests. I then 
began to reaUze that I had no home and no inti- 
mates with whom to spend my leisure hours. The 
longer I dwelt on the matter the clearer it became 
to me, that I was robbing myself and that I should 
starve my heart unless its demands were heeded. 
Then, too, I could not forget her whose happiness, 
next to the divine approval, was the dearest object 
of my Ufe. StiU, it seemed ridiculous, in the cir- 
cumstances, to think of increasing my obligations. 



82 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

for my charge was too small to support two, and, 
although I knew that I had done good work, I 
could not hope that my elder would promote me. 
The time came, however, when I could not endure 
the loneliness that was growing on me. Therefore, 
ignoring fact and reason, I wrote, in substance: 
"If you are willing to share the hfe of a Methodist 
minister, with no present prospect of advancement, 
come home; the sooner the better." 

That must have been in May. While my letter 
was on its way to Germany I received an invitation, 
as a visitor, to the Commencement Exercises at 
Wesleyan University. I accepted and performed 
my duties there without suspecting any ulterior ob- 
ject on the part of the Faculty. On the way back, 
as Miss Stanford had meanwhile returned, I 
stopped at Springfield and we were married, June 
29, 1880, and, three days later, after a brief visit to 
my parents, reached my appointment. The next 
day, which was Sunday, was a trying one, but we 
had counted the cost of our venture, and we took 
up our work prepared to do or bear anything it 
entailed. 

I now felt that I was equipped for my duties as 
I had not been hitherto, and I expected to proceed 
with them with increased zeal and success. Here 
again, however, as when I offered myself to the 
Missionary Society, I had brought a sacrifice which 



MY FIRST AND ONLY PARISH 83 

I was providentially discharged from presenting, 
for, on the second day after my return, I received 
a letter informing me that I had been elected a 
tutor at my Alma Mater. 

Not that I accepted the position without hesita- 
tion. In fact, I should have been obhged to de- 
cline it if the original terms had not been changed. 
They required me to teach Latin and German. I 
objected to that, although I felt perfectly able to 
teach German, I did not like Latin and therefore 
had not given it special attention; also that, as I 
had spent several years on Hebrew and the Old 
Testament, I should not feel justified in leaving 
the regular ministry to teach languages unless He- 
brew was one of them. I suggested, therefore, that 
my work be in Hebrew and German, also that the 
salary, which did not tempt me, be somewhat in- 
creased. The result was a revised proposal to the 
effect that I teach Latin and Hebrew at an in- 
creased salary. With this offer I went to my El- 
der, saying, "Here is an opening for me, but, as it 
is not what I've hoped for, I'll decline it if you can 
assure me, that next year you'll help me to a place 
where I shall have a decent support." He replied 
in his brusque way without hesitation, "I can't 
make any promises." "Very well," I then said, "you 
may arrange to supply my place on and after the 
first Sunday in September," and left him. 



84 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

I have taken a critical tone with reference to Bro. 
Beebee, but I am not sure that I ought not to 
reckon him among my creditors, for if I had not 
been sent to his district, it might have made a great 
difference in my future. I learned of this possi- 
bility when, after leaving my place, I stopped at 
Syracuse on my way to the East. There I hap- 
pened to meet the Elder of that district. He asked 
me where I was bound, and I told him. "That's 
too bad!" he said, "I wanted you last fall for a 
church here in the city; but they wouldn't let me 
have you. Is it too late now to change your plans? 
I'll do better by you than the University." Of 
covu-se, I could not profit by his generosity, but I 
was gratified to know, that I might have had a 
chance as a preacher. 

The years I spent at Middletown were the hard- 
est I have ever had as a teacher and in some re- 
spects the most unsatisfactory. The trouble, of 
course, was with the Latin. I ought not to have 
been asked to teach it; but in those days the impor- 
tance of specialization was just beginning to be 
realized, most people taking for granted that a man 
who had a doctorate from a university, especially if 
it were German, could teach anything in the college 
curriculum. And I had so much of it; two classes 
daily, with the same lesson, week in and week out, 
from one end of the year to the other! Sometimes 



MY FIRST AND ONLY PARISH 85 

it seemed as if I could not endure it. I should not 
have been able to, but for the hour a day with my 
class in Hebrew. There I felt so much at home 
that, after trying the textbooks in common use and 
finding them wanting, I threw them aside and 
adopted a method of my own which proved so satis- 
factory that I afterward published it. It was my 
experience with Hebrew, I presume, that encour- 
aged me to introduce some features calculated to 
enliven our recitations in Latin and stimulate an in- 
creased interest in the language. I also interested 
myself personally in the students in my classes, and, 
if they showed scholarly aptitudes, suggested ways 
in which these could be cultivated. I have since 
seen some fruit from such personal work; but it 
did not then promise enough to warrant me in re- 
maining where I was if I could find a more con- 
genial position. I was therefore very greatly re- 
lieved when, at the end of my third year, I was 
notified that the exegetical department at the 
School of Theology of Boston University had been 
divided and that I could have Hebrew and the Old 
Testament, which I accepted with alacrity and 
gratitude. 

Before leaving Middletown, at the suggestion of 
Professor Prentice, I joined the recently founded 
Society of Bibhcal Literature and Exegesis and 
thus became more intimately acquainted with that 



86 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

rare man and scholar, Frederic Gardner, its Secre- 
tary, who, shortly afterward, when he was obliged 
to resign the office, recommended me as his suc- 
cessor. Thus, in advance of my removal to Bos- 
ton, I was put into a position in which I became 
acquainted with most of the leading bibhcal schol- 
ars in the eastern part of our country. This posi- 
tion I retained for six years, or until a trip to 
Palestine made it necessary to resign, meanwhile, 
not only keeping the records of the Society, but 
publishing the Journal and contributing more than 
my share of its contents. 



THE FIRST FIVE YEARS IN BOSTON 

My first five years in Boston were naturally hard 
ones ; but I shrank from nothing, and I think that 
our good Dean was satisfied. Now and then I 
needed his assistance, and I always got it. He 
stood by me, when, finding the students in my 
classes careless and neglectful, I undertook to raise 
the standard. The test came when one of the Sen- 
iors, who had failed in the first examination, refused 
to accept his rating and went to the Dean with the 
matter. The Doctor told him that each instructor 
was supreme in his department and that, therefore, 
if I had said that he must take a second examina- 
tion, there was no escape for him. I did not say 
anything further to him until he was leaving the 
room after the final test. Then I asked him if he 
had forgotten that he did not pass on the work of 
the first term. "Why," he replied, "I thought you 
let that drop." When I told him that he was mis- 
taken, he went again to the Dean. The Doctor 
heard him patiently, but, in the end told him that 
he could not graduate unless he fulfilled my re- 
quirements. The young man, of course, took the 
examination, and I never had any further difficulty 

87 



88 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

of the same nature. Moreover, when he came to 
himself, he forgot his resentment and became one 
of my best friends and supporters. 

I had as much difficulty about finding a satisf ac- 
toiy Hebrew textbook in Boston as I had experi- 
enced in Middletown. I finally undertook to make 
one that would answer my purpose. I decided that 
it should be : 

Elementary, in the sense of being restricted to the 
simplest general outline of the language ; 

Logical, in the sense of presenting these elements 
in a natural order as needed ; 

Practical, in the sense of requiring the applica- 
tion of the things learned, as learned. 

I do not need to describe the book, since it has 
been in use nearly thirty-five years and bids fair to 
continue in some favor; but there is one feature of 
the book that is especially interesting. When I 
had gotten so far along with it as to begin to look 
for exercises, I said to myself that, if I could find 
a rather extended passage of the right kind in the 
Old Testament, I should like to make it the basis 
for them. I had hardly conceived this possibility 
before I thought of Gen. 24, the story of Rebecca. 
On examining it, I found that it was precisely what 
I wanted: a chapter of sixty-seven verses, with a 
vocabulary of more than two hundred words. 



THE FIRST FIVE YEARS IN BOSTON 89 

largely the most familiar in the language. It 
served me so well, therefore, that I needed very- 
few additional to supply the paradigms as well as 
the exercises. Finally, I put the chapter first 
among the selections at the back of the book, thus 
making it possible for the student to review his 
work without turning back to the lessons. 

When I began my work in the School of Theol- 
ogy I gave but three hours a week to Hebrew, but 
after a time I asked for a fourth, and later still, 
finding a fifth at my disposal on Monday, I occu- 
pied it, the fall term for illustrated lectures, and 
the rest of the year for Hebrew. This, of course, 
was much more time than had ever before been 
given to the language ; but, since the students had it 
to spare and I was willing to do the additional work 
required, I saw no serious objection to the arrange- 
ment. I was desirous that it should prevail, because, 
although our students were largely college men, 
many of them were so sadly lacking in ability to 
think for themselves, that I felt sure they would 
miss much of the benefit of a theological course, un- 
less they had additional mental discipline such as 
one gets from a language intensively studied. 
Then, too, I knew that there was a strong preju- 
dice in the Methodist Church against the critical 
study of the Old Testament, but I hoped that, with 



90 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

a little more time, any student who was affected by 
it would come to trust me enough to give me at 
least an impartial hearing. 

When I was at Wesleyan I now and then gave 
my classes in Latin a test in sight-reading. When 
I came to Boston I employed this method to an 
even greater extent; until, indeed, I ceased to 
assign passages of Hebrew to be translated in pri- 
vate. They were all read for the first time in the 
class and studied by the individual students after- 
ward. I found that this method 

Secured the constant interest of the entire class; 

Fixed attention upon the most significant parts 
of the discourse ; 

Stimulated the student's imagination, thus ena- 
bling him to guess the meaning of unfamiliar words 
from the context ; 

Fixed recurrent words quickly and firmly in the 
memory; and 

Emboldened the student to read by himself with- 
out a dictionary. I sometimes took advantage of 
this last fact to make of the recitation a kind of 
game, letting each one read as long as he could 
without making a mistake. At the end of the year 
I gave them the choice between being examined on 
what they had read or on an entirely new passage, 
with help on five or six words, and they almost all 



THE FIRST FIVE YEARS IN BOSTON 91 

preferred to try the latter method ; which invariably 
caused a sensation in the Examining Committee. 

I have referred to the educational value of He- 
brew and the opportunity a thorough course gave 
me to win the confidence of the students; but, of 
course, the prime object was to prepare them to 
read the Old Testament in the original and inter- 
pret it with some degree of correctness. Natur- 
ally, therefore, Hebrew was required, not only in 
the first year, but in the exegetical work of most of 
the other two. There were good reasons for this; 
namely, the student thus became more intimately 
acquainted with Hebrew modes of thought and ob- 
tained a more precise conception of a given author's 
meaning. Now and then one forgot these consid- 
erations and offered the suggestion that we could 
"make better progress with the English version; per- 
haps he called attention to the fact that some of the 
theological schools were making Hebrew elective; 
but as, under the circumstances, the quality of the 
work done was of more consequence than the 
quantity, I thought best not to change my program 
and the Faculty endorsed my decision. 

I have said enough in the preceding paragraph 
to indicate that from the first I took my exegetical 
wor'k seriously. I can say more; namely, that I 
then put myself under bonds to my conscience to 



92 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

employ every means by which light is thrown upon 
the meaning of the Sacred Books, always to let 
their authors say what they will in their own way, 
without reference to my opinions, and never, for 
the sake of popular or ecclesiastical favor, to tam- 
per with their utterances. These are the rules 
which I laid down for myself; and I held myself to 
them, not only in the conduct of my classes, but in 
all the books or articles into which I was later 
moved to put my exegetical teachings. 

Having said what I have concerning my methods 
and principles, I ought, perhaps, to say something 
albout my views on certain subjects belonging to 
my department. I shall have to confess that, for 
example on the origin and history of the books of 
the Old Testament, they were not so clear and firm 
as they might have been. The reason was, that al- 
though while I was in Germany, I read and heard 
much on the subject, I did not make a specialty of 
it, and therefore naturally followed my celebrated 
teacher. Professor Delitzsch, who, as I have already 
mentioned, was then inclined to be somewhat con- 
servative. When, however, I found myself at the 
head of an Old Testament department, I felt the 
necessity of having positive ideas of my own and 
being able to maintain them. This necessity was 
the more pressing because W. Robertson Smith 
had recently created a sensation in Great Britain 



THE FIRST FIVE YEARS IN BOSTON 93 

and his books were exciting a deal of discussion in 
America. Briggs's Biblical Study and Green's 
Moses and the Prophets were both published in 
1883. The next year, or as soon as I had my He- 
brew Lessons off my hands, I started a "seminar," 
as the Germans call it, and persuaded a couple of 
my more advanced students to join it for the 
thorough examination of Smith's Old Testament in 
the Jewish Church, which I thought I could answer. 
I went through it word for word, making careful 
notes and discussing in the class with the most per- 
fect freedom every point of any importance. 
When we were done I felt that I had made a good 
showing, and I imagine that the students were of 
the same opinion. 

I am not sure that I ever repeated this course, 
for I was constantly reading and thinking, and the 
more deeply I went into the new views, the more 
strongly they appealed to me. I did not, however, 
adopt them v/holesale, or any of them without 
thorough examination. I was calm, too, withal 
and without anxiety for I knew that, so long as I 
sought the truth with all my heart, I should be re- 
ligiously safe, and that in the end I must be led 
to more satisfactory conclusions. I do not now re- 
call how long I was in this transitional stage, but 
I very distinctly remember that, pursued in this 
spirit, my critical studies became, not merely a 



94* FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

source of mental discipline, but a veritable means 
of grace, and that many of the students, following 
the same course, escaped the suffering that young 
thinkers often have to endure in the process of 
changing their minds. 

Many, but by no means all. There were those 
in my classes whose experience was almost tragic. 
It was partly my fault for a time, because I used 
the first chapters of Genesis for practice while we 
were studying the Hebrew language and thus giv- 
ing occasion for questions that they were not pre- 
pared to discuss. I was not, however, altogether 
to blame, for some of them, as I have intimated, 
lacked mental training or harbored prejudices that 
forbade theological progress. When I saw my 
mistake I substituted passages from Judges and 
Samuel for those from Genesis, and by this means 
avoided the discussion of critical questions until the 
second year. 

When the time came for such discussion I not 
only did not suppress, but invited it, insisting, how- 
ever, that it should not be mere talk, but an earnest 
endeavor to reach the truth. I first laid before the 
class the facts in a given case, taking pains to ex- 
plain difficulties and correct misunderstandings 
that were generally current or seemed to be enter- 
tained by the students. The facts having been 
stated, we discussed the various theories that had 



THE FIRST FIVE YEARS IN BOSTON 95 

been based on them. There are teachers who stop 
here, taking to themselves great credit for liberal- 
ity, because they neither commend any particular 
view to their students nor require them to choose 
among them ; a method dictated by incompetence or 
cowardice. I made a practice of studying subjects 
until I had opinions about them, and I insisted that 
my students, also, should cultivate the habit of 
making up their minds as they went along; that 
such a habit would not only be of great intellectual 
advantage to them, but furnish them with an ele- 
ment of power such as characterized the ancient 
prophets in their ministry. Of course, I was care- 
ful to explain, not only that I did not require them 
to adopt my views, but also that I marked them ac- 
cording to the ability with which they defended 
their honest convictions, even when I considered 
them mistaken. I felt that, if I could teach them 
to think, I could trust them in the end to correct 
their most serious errors and do the minimum of 
harm with the others. This was my method. I 
know of no better way to make genuine sons of 
prophets. 



A TRIP TO PALESTINE 

Soon after I came to Boston I began to see the 
importance to the student of the Bible of a 
thorough acquaintance with the Holy Land. Fi- 
nally I set myself to work to prepare to visit it. I 
spent much of my spare time for fully two years 
in reading descriptions of it, studying guide books 
and pictures, and even, for the purpose of fasten- 
ing the facts and impressions gathered in my mind, 
giving illustrated lectures to my classes on the sub- 
ject. When, therefore, on the fourth of March, 
1888, after a brief visit to Egypt, Mrs. Mitchell 
and I landed at Jaffa, I felt not only that I was 
realizing a long cherished desire, but that I was 
prepared to derive a great profit from the oppor- 
tunity. I resolved to see as much of the country 
as possible in the time at my disposal and to treas- 
ure every item of knowledge thus gained that 
would throw the least light upon anything in the 
Scriptures. 

We stayed only a day at Jaffa, but it was a day 
to be remembered as that of our introduction to 
the genial climate of the Plain of Sharon and the 
vivid life of the Orient. The next day we drove 



A TRIP TO PALESTINE 97 

to Jerusalem, stopping on the way to lunch and 
picked scarlet anemones and purple cyclamens 
among the rocks at Latrun and reaching the city in 
time to visit the Holy Sepulcher before it was closed 
for the night. We remained at or near Jerusalem 
for five weeks. While there, we were so fortunate 
as to lodge at the German Hospice or the so-called 
American Colony, and take all our meals at the 
former excellent estabhshment. We seldom, there- 
fore, suffered inconveniences or indisposition from 
the climate or the peculiarities of oriental life. 
We were additionally fortunate in being a!ble to 
draw upon the abundant experience, not only of 
Superintendent Bayer of the Hospice, but of Dr. 
Conrad Schick and the Rev. J. E. Hanauer, two 
gentlemen who had long enjoyed a reputation for 
their familiarity with the history and archeology of 
Palestine. 

My first object, naturally, was to become 
thoroughly familiar with Jerusalem, its remarkable 
site and its characteristic features. To this end I 
studied it from every angle until I knew the lay of 
the ground and the relation of every part, in the 
matters of elevation and accessibility, to every 
other part, so that I could understand where the city 
must have originated and what must have been the 
order of its development from a petty fortress into 
a moimtain capital ; also why, under the vicissitudes 



98 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

of subsequent centuries the growth or decay took 
the direction indicated by remaining traces. In 
reaching my conclusions on these points I had the 
help of my friend and former teacher, Professor 
Guthe, of Leipzig, the report of whose excavations 
at Jerusalem I found in the hbrary at the Hospice. 

We made several fruitful excursions from Jeru- 
salem as a centre. The first was to Nebi Samwil, 
with its wide outlook, including the Mediterranean 
Sea and the mountains of Moab. A little later we 
spent a day in visiting Mar Saba monastery on 
the Kedron below Jerusalem, returning by way of 
the busy little city of Bethlehem. We next took 
a trip to Jericho, the Dead Sea, and the Jordan, 
returning on the third day, not by the carriage 
road, but by a little used path over the hills west 
of Jericho to Michmash and thence by way of 
Anata (Anathoth) the home of Jeremiah, back to 
Jerusalem. Finally, with a couple of friends we 
visited Hebron, and, on the second day, bidding 
them good-bye at Solomon's Pools we went in 
search of Tekoa, the home of the prophet Amos ; an 
excursion which cost us a weary afternoon, but fur- 
nished us the most inspiring prospect we saw in 
Palestine. 

The minor excursions above described were all 
made on horseback, and therefore not merely fruit- 
ful in themselves, but preparatory to the great 



A TRIP TO PALESTINE 99 

adventure on which we started when, on the eleventh 
of April, we finally left Jerusalem. We went in 
a party of twelve, aU men but Mrs. Mitchell, under 
a dragoman, with eight tents, thirteen servants, 
twenty horses, thirteen mules, and four donkeys. 
We were a small company, but, as we learned en 
route^ we were about as well equipped as other 
tourists. This means that we had as good horses 
as one ought to expect to find in such a country as 
Palestine, and better tents, food, and service than 
could be had on the same terms in Europe or 
America. It does not, however, mean that we 
traveled under ideal conditions. We did not. In 
the first place, the method of travel was strange to 
us, and therefore uncomfortable, in some cases 
hazardous; for although, ordinarily in Palestine, 
in April, little rain is expected, on our trip more 
or less fell on eight of the first eleven days, and the 
weather was generally so unpropitious that we men 
suffered more or less seriously in consequence, and 
I did not recover from a drenching we got at Naz- 
areth until after I returned to America. 

The most serious complaint we had to make was 
that we did not get as much benefit as we ought to 
have derived from so extended and expensive a 
pilgrimage. That, of course, was to some extent 
due to our own lack of preparation, but it was also 
in part the fault of our dragoman, who, although 



100 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

he had a fund of curious legends and traditions 
from which he sometimes amused us, he knew little 
about the country, and less aibout its successive 
occupants. Still, we could not but be grateful to 
be piloted about from one to another of the places 
consecrated by the great Hebrews whose God we 
worship : Bethel, where Jacob prayed and Amos 
prophesied; Shiloh, where Samuel served Yahweh's 
altar; Shechem, where Abraham received his title 
to Canaan; Samaria, where Micaiah stood alone 
for Yahweh and the truth; Jezreel, where Elijah 
called Ahab to account ; and Shunem, where Elisha 
found rest and comfort. And who would nol 
count it a memorable privilege to visit Nain, where 
Jesus dried a widow's tears; Nazareth, where he 
grew and taught among his fellows; the sea on 
whose thronged shores he loved to live and work; 
and Cgesarea Philippi, where his favorite disciples 
saw him glorified. We saw all these places, and 
many more with genuine profit and enjoyment, 
then climbed over the lap of Hermon to the famous 
old city of Damascus, probably passing within 
sight of the site of Paul's conversion; climbed back 
into the vaUey of Coele-Syria to admire the colossal 
ruins of Baalbec, and finally, crossing the western 
range of Lebanon, disbanded at Beirut on the 
Mediterranean. 

The pilgrimage ended at Beirut, but we stayed 



A TRIP TO PALESTINE 101 

there several days, partly because I was unfit to 
travel, partly because I wished to complete a col- 
lection of photographs on which I had already 
spent a deal of time and thought while we were in 
Jerusalem, and finally, because I felt that I could 
not neglect the opportunity to become acquainted 
with men so thoroughly at home in Syria as were 
some of those connected with the American Colony. 
The results were even greater than I expected, for, 
not only did rest and a careful diet improve my 
physical condition and the hours spent with the 
photographers add scores to the number of my 
pictures, but the professors at the college gave us 
freely any information desired, and their families, 
by their sympathy and ministrations, made our stay 
among them as delightful as it was profitable. 

I took my visit to Palestine very seriously, even 
as an important part of the preparation for the 
work in the School of Theology. When we left 
Beirut, however, I naturally felt a degree of relief 
as well as satisfaction. StiU I continued to note 
with care the scenes and incidents experienced, as 
if they too were of more importance than the in- 
cidental amusements of an idle traveler. Indeed, 
as I have gone through my journal, it has suggested 
itself that I must then have felt, as I did when 
studying in Germany, that art and nature have a 
serious educative value. At any rate, I can now 



102 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

see it, and I shall not apologize for not going as 
directly as possible from Beirut to Leipzig, but 
taking a zigzag course by the ^gean and Adriatic 
Seas and spending more than a month on the way, 
I must, however, leave to be imagined, how keenly 
we enjoyed the minarets of Constantinople, the 
architecture and sculpture of Athens, the churches 
and paintings of Venice and Milan, the lakes of 
Northern Italy, and the mountains seen from the 
Luzern, Bern, and Lausanee. I will add only that 
among them we gathered impressions of beauty or 
grandeur that have lasted us all our Uves. 

Long as our journey had been, it was only the 
middle of June when we reached Leipzig, and there 
were yet three months before I was due in America. 
I had so planned, because, having now been teach- 
ing five years— I finished the fifth in half time— in 
Boston, I had learned where I needed further 
training, and I knew of no place where I could 
study to greater advantage than in the good old 
Saxon city. We spent the rest of the summer 
there and, during that time, I not only read eagerly, 
but added largely to my library on the subjects I 
was teaching, not a little assisted by suggestions 
from some of my former teachers. The result was 
that, when I came home, I was pretty thoroughly 
confirmed in my ideas and I resumed my work 
with increased confidence and enthusiasm. 



A BRIEF BUT HAPPY PERIOD 

I had from the first enjoyed my position. I now 
found myself increasingly happy in it. In the 
first place, I saw that the School was prospering. 
It had nearly doubled its numbers in my first ^ve 
years, and it was still growing. Moreover, and 
this was especially encouraging, the rate of increase 
in graduate students was greater than in those 
without college training, and the quality of the men 
in both classes was noticeably better. Nor were we 
of the Theological Faculty the only ones to see the 
improvement. Those of our students who had 
electives in the Philosophical Department began to 
take rank with the best of their classmates. At 
the same time they and others of the same stamp 
increased the efficiency of our School by putting 
its professors on their metal and forcing them to 
do the best of which they were capable. I am more 
than willing to confess that I felt their urge, but 
I encouraged them to ask as well as answer ques- 
tions, for I realized that few of my teachers had 
ever done as much to educate me in the strictest 
sense as some of those whom I was trying to edu- 
cate. I think that they would now say with me, 

103 



104. FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

that the hours when we forgot the lesson in the 
pursuit of some vital question were the times when 
we made most real and rapid progress. 

This give-and-take method not only brought out 
helpful suggestions on the point in question; it re- 
vealed us to one another and enabled me to lend the 
students a hand in matters not "nominated in the 
bond" with the University. For several years I 
made a practice of visiting them in their rooms, 
especially when they were ill or in difficulty of any 
sort, and I only ceased to do so when I was accused 
of taking this way to spread my alleged heresies. 
I took especial interest in their outside work. 
Many of them had to support themselves, and, as 
they had preached more or less, they naturally pre- 
ferred that means of meeting their expenses. 
Fortunately there were many places in, and within 
reach of, Boston where their services were needed ; 
but I found that the matter was often so bhndly 
or carelessly managed that the student, the Church, 
the School of Theology, one or all, suffered. To 
prevent these results I prepared a list of the places 
which looked to the School for their preachers, and 
a second of the students who wished to support 
themselves by preaching. Then, as I had oppor- 
tunity, I informed the Presiding Elders, or others, 
who had the churches in charge, that, knowing the 
students, as I did, and their ability, I thought I 



A BRIEF BUT HAPPY PERIOD 105 

could help them in selecting preachers, and the 
students that I should be glad to aid them in get- 
ting places. For the protection of the School, 
however, I warned the latter, that I could heartily 
recommend only those who not only had ability, but 
were giving good proof of it in their studies. Since 
I took pains to have it understood that this rule 
applied to ail departments and I required no fur- 
ther return for myself personally, I was permitted 
to continue my self-imposed services as long as I 
remained connected with the University. 

I must not omit to notice the effect on my rela- 
tions with the students of our common interest in 
missions. It first showed itself in a meeting at the 
Seminary in February, 1887, as the result of which 
a band of forty was formed whose members were 
pledged to devote an evening a week to missionary 
work. For three years they maintained their ac- 
tivity and employed themselves in assisting the 
JMethodist pastors of Boston and its vicinity or 
conducting meetings at the missions of other de- 
nominations, without organized support ; but in the 
fall of 1889, the Boston City Missionary and 
Church Extension Society, at first called the 
Bureau of Missions, provided them with a place 
for nightly meetings. Thus was formed an al- 
liance for which the friends of the School of The- 
ology had long prayed and labored, an alliance 



106 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

destined, not only to demonstrate Christianity to 
the poor of the city, but to train disciples of Jesus 
for this field and for Hke service in other parts of 
the country. I was deeply interested in the move- 
ment. In fact, I gave the most of my spare time 
to it ; but I did not wish a prominent part in it, be- 
cause it originated with the students and I thought 
they should have any credit they could earn by 
carrying it forward successfully. I was quite con- 
tent to be one of them in their meetings and keep 
the supporting society, of which I was a member, 
informed of what they were doing and when they 
needed assistance. They showed their apprecia- 
tion of my help, and, as time passed, some, who 
had been prejudiced against me, began to be more 
teachable. They had been told that my views on 
the Bible were destructive of faith in God and zeal 
for his kingdom. I had tried to show them, that, 
on the other hand, they made for a firmer faith and 
a saner zeal than they were displacing. Of course, 
they might have said that I was making my mis- 
sionary activity, a cloak for my heresies, but, not 
being ready to call me a hypocrite, the worst they 
allowed themselves was some such remark as was 
later actually made by a new student: "If I hadn't 
been with you at the North End, I don't know what 
I should think of your theology"; which, said as 



A BRIEF BUT HAPPY PERIOD 107 

we were parting after a meeting, proved a very 
welcome nightcap. 

I said above that, after my return from Palestine, 
I enjoyed my work even more than in any preced- 
ing period and I think I have shown cause for hav- 
ing found increased pleasure in it. Indeed, I be- 
lieve I was happier during the next few years than 
I ever was afterward, because although, as I have 
intimated, I was more or less hindered by prejudice 
and misconception; there was not the positive, de- 
liberate opposition to my teachings in the School 
of Theology or in the Church that afterward de- 
veloped. 



A TIME OF REFRESHING 

The happy period above described was rounded 
off by an equally enjoyable furlough. The Trus- 
tees of the University had recently decreed that its 
professors, after seven years of work, should have 
a year for recreation in the broadest sense of the 
term, rejuvenation of the forces of the body and 
reinforcement of the powers of the mind; when, 
therefore, I finished the school year 1890-91 I was 
entitled to a leave of absence on half pay and I re- 
ceived it. I spent it partly in travel and partly 
in study. First, with Mrs. Mitchell and a friend 
I took a (largely) walking trip of ten days on the 
Rhine, from Cologne to Heidelberg. Then, after 
an excursion to Eisenach, we went to Bayreuth for 
a week of music. The next month Mrs. Mitchell 
and I spent in the Tyrol, three weeks of it in or 
near Innsbruck, the rest among the Dolomites and 
on a carriage trip from Meran to Landeck. 
Thence we went to Switzerland to see the Rhone 
Valley, with Zermatt and the Matterhorn and 
Chamounix and Mont Blanc; also St. Gallen and 
the rest of the country through which we had wan- 
dered with Ekkehardt; finally returning and tak- 

108 



A TIME OF REFRESHING 109 

ing Freiburg, Eisenach, Erfurt, and Weimar on 
our way to Liepzig. 

This time I had a serious purpose in coming to 
our favorite German city. In the first place, being 
in time for the opening of the winter semester, I 
intended to take a few lectures at the University. 
I chose a course on Introduction to the Old Testa" 
ment, by Buhl, a friend of my student days, and 
one on the Theology of the Old Testament, by 
Guthe, one of my former teachers. This, however, 
was not to be my principal object. I had brought 
with me the first draft of a commentary on the 
Book of Amos, intending to rewrite it before 
spring; which I did, in spite of various hindrances. 
I called the book Amos, an Essay in Exegesis, 
because I wished, not only to make my students 
familiar with the man Amos and his religious teach- 
ings, but to illustrate what seemed to me the proper 
method to apply in such a work. First, I said to 
myself, the reader should be as fully prepared as 
possible to understand the author as he reads. 
The first part of my book, therefore, consisted of 
three introductory studies, one on the person of the 
prophet, a second on the date of his mission, and a 
third on the structure of his book. For the second 
part I made a careful translation of the book, to 
give the student a general idea of its teachings, 
followed by notes which so completely reproduced 



110 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

the substance of it that they could be studied with- 
out constant reference to the unbroken text. 
Finally, in the third part, to help the student to see 
the prophet in his relations, I added three supple- 
mentary studies on, first, Amos and the Hexateuch, 
second, his theology, and third, his place among 
the prophets. 

I greatly enjoyed this work, because now, as 
when I read Virgil and the Anabasis at home and 
when I wrote my doctor's dissertation, I had all my 
time to myself and not much else to occupy me. 
There were, however, as I have intimated, certain 
hindrances. First, the weather, which is always 
depressing in a German winter, was so wretchedly 
gloomy that year that I often had to work all day 
by lamplight. At first, also, I was sometimes 
bothered to get the books I needed. The rules of 
the University Library seemed made for the mini- 
mum of convenience. Once, for example, I pre- 
sented a ticket at the desk and asked when I could 
have the book named. The attendant replied: 
"It's now afternoon. You'll have to drop the 
ticket into the box at the door and come for the 
book in the morning. No, tomorrow begins our 
annual inspection, which lasts a fortnight. You'll 
have to wait until two weeks from tomorrow." 
Thereupon, as I happened to be the only other 
person in the room at the time, I asked him what 



A TIME OF REFRESHING 111 

there was to hinder him from going at once himself 
and getting the book for me, and, when he had re- 
covered from his astonishment at my audacity, he 
adopted my suggestion. This red tape was so an- 
noying that I finally hired the books I most needed 
of a bookseller for the winter for ten per cent, of 
their value. 

I finished my Amos about the first of March and 
at once began another book, a translation of Pie- 
penbring's Theologie de V Ancien Testament, A 
little later, when the University took its spring 
vacation, and we were free to resume our travels, 
we left Leipzig for Italy. Our first objective was 
Florence, where we had a friend. Professor E. S. 
Stackpole, who greatly added to our comfort and 
enjoyment during a stay of nine days in the city, 
by making us at home in his family. He or his 
wife coached us concerning the things best worth 
seeing in our daily excursions, and in the evening 
we gave them the latest theological news from 
Northern Europe. I was more than satisfied with 
my winnings from this interchange, for, when we 
left Florence, I felt that my acquaintance with the 
Florentine artists, and the times in which they lived 
and wrought, had been broadened and clarified, 
and that it had also done me good to have to repre- 
sent modern biblical criticism in a heart to heart 
discussion with a man as remarkable for his intel- 



112 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

ligence as for the earnestness of his religious life. 
I afterward learned that he, too, had profited, for, 
the next time I met him, he greeted me with the 
exclamation, "Now I can believe anything"; mean- 
ing that he was willing to accept without hesitation 
anything that commended itself to the faculties 
divinely given him for his guidance and protection : 
the ideal and, as I always taught my students, only 
proper, attitude for the Christian thinker. 

From Florence we went to Rome. We had al- 
ready had a glimpse of this famous city. On our 
way to Palestine, as we were crossing from Naples 
to Brindisi, we had to wait there, and, not knowing 
whether we should ever again have such an oppor- 
tunity, we took a carriage at the station and visited 
all the points of interest that an honest driver 
could reach in eighty minutes. This time we had 
ten days to spend there, and we made the most of 
them. We did not, however, enjoy Rome as much 
as Florence, the reason being, not that we had to 
live in a pension instead of a private family, — for 
the pension was a good one, — but that in Florence 
we had found a delightful naturalness and spon- 
taneity reflected in its artistic productions which 
made us from the first feel at home among them. 
In Rome things were not only on a larger scale, 
but they seemed foreign to their surroundings and 
temporarily there on exhibition; and this effect 



A TIME OF REFRESHING 113 

was produced by St. Peter's as well as the ruins of 
the Forum. Still, we felt it a great privilege to 
visit the city and take even a hasty survey of its 
wonderful collections. We naturally spent most 
time at the Vatican. I was so deeply impressed by 
its variously beautiful contents that I have ever 
since been grateful not only to the countless artists 
there represented for the worthy use they made of 
their gifts, but to the patrons who encouraged them 
in the practice of their arts and the collectors who 
preserved their works for the sesthetical gratifica- 
tion and education of mankind. For mankind, I 
say, for those who are called the owners of such 
collections are coming more and more to regard 
themselves merely as stewards, or else are putting 
them actually under public administration. 

The trip to Italy we regarded as a vacation. 
When therefore, we had spent three weeks there, 
we made all haste to Paris, where I expected to 
finish my translation of Piepenbring's book and 
incidentally hear some of the men of note who were 
lecturing at the College de France, and the Protes- 
tant Seminary. We took lodgings in the Latin 
Quarter, where we had friends, and did light house- 
keeping. In the morning I worked at my trans- 
lation, except when there was a lecturer whom I 
wanted to hear; Renan, Oppert, Maspero, Cler- 
mont-Ganneau, or Ph. Berger at the College, or 



114 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Stapfer or S. Berger at the Seminary. I felt that 
I could not afford to lose an opportunity to hear 
any of them. There evidently were not many 
others of this mind, except with reference to Renan, 
who always had a small room full, — perhaps a third 
women, — whom he amused, as he sat playing with 
his dehcate hands, by racy comments on the Old 
Testament. Ph. Berger had only eight or ten 
students to hear him, Oppert and Maspero four 
each, and Clermont- Ganneau but two and three or 
four visitors. They were all, again excepting 
Renan, plain men, modest in their bearing, but 
each of them thoroughly at home in his sub j ect and 
independent in his treatment of it. This was the 
program for the forenoon; in the afternoon we 
went sight-seeing, oftenest "over to the city," as 
we expressed it, especially to the Louvre. We did 
not go a;bout quite as freely as we wished because 
there were threats of an anarchistic outbreak, espe- 
cially on the first of May, when we denied ourselves 
a visit to Versailles on that account. 

We lived this life of alternate work and play for 
five happy weeks. At the end of that time, as 
my translation was practically complete, we felt 
that we should move, and, acting on the impulse, 
crossed to England and next settled at Oxford, 
which I had always imagined an ideal place to 
study. Here, also, we lived, as the students lived, 



A TIME OF REFRESHING 115 

in rooms, our landlady cooking and serving the 
food which we provided, and generally conformed 
to the traditions of the place. Through the kind- 
ness of Professor Francis Brown, later President 
of Union Theological Seminary, I became ac- 
quainted with the Librarian at the Bodleian, where 
I was invited to read as much as I would. I grate- 
fully accepted the privilege and there for five more 
weeks it was my delight to sit, surrounded by rare 
books, and pursue the subject in which I was inter- 
ested. I also met some of the professors of the 
colleges, namely, Cheyne, Driver, and Fairbairn, 
and heard Sayce, Ramsay and Max Muller lecture. 
Of all these the one who impressed me most was 
Fairbairn, because he was the only one who showed 
marked virility. I got a different impression of 
three young men, then just coming forward, who 
have since w^on distinction, G. Buchanan Gray, of 
Mansfield ; Claude G. Montefiore, whom I heard in 
the Hibbert Lectures of that year, and Mr. Gore, 
then devoted to a little mission near Oxford, who 
was later to be honored with the episcopal ofiice. 
On the whole I was rather disappointed with the 
University, perhaps because I did not understand 
the English character. There was less earnestness, 
both in the professors and their students, than I 
expected. This lack showed itself in the ceremony 
of conferring the usual degrees at the House of 



116 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Convocation, which was almost ridiculously per- 
functory, but especially in the Commemoration 
Exercises, where the honorary degrees given were 
robbed of any dignity by the continuous chaffing 
of students posted in the gallery for the purpose. 
Some of the sallies were very good in the eyes — 
better to the ears — of the audience ; but that made 
them only the more annoying. For example, the 
gentleman who introduced the candidates had a 
nervous cough. The boys first imitated it, then 
suggested a cough-drop, and finally, with well 
simulated anxiety, recommended a doctor; thereby 
throwing him into such confusion that he could 
hardly perform his office. An Indian prince, as 
he came forward, was asked if he used Pear's soap ; 
and when a number of Dublin professors, one after 
another, were introduced, some one, with pretended 
indignation, exclaimed, "One more indignity on 
Ireland." We were told that, when Tennyson 
came up for a degree, he was asked, in allusion to 
his tousled head, "Did your mother wake and call 
you early, Alfred dear?'' and Holmes, "Doctor, 
did you come in your one-horse shay?" 

I went to Oxford to make some further re- 
searches on the subject of the Pentateuch. When 
I found that I had done all I could there, but that 
we still had some days before we were to sail for 
home, it seemed best to give them to southwestern 



A TIME OF REFRESHING 117 

England, first the cathedral cities of Winchester, 
Sahsbury, and Exeter, and then the country made 
famous by Kingsley in Westward Ho. We spent 
a week in the most delightful retirement and idle- 
ness among the fishermen of Clovelly and returned 
to London by way of Gladstonbury and Wells. 
This was the last of our excursions, but on the way 
to Liverpool we took occasion to revisit Warwick, 
Stratford, and Chester. 

I have given a good deal of space to this my first 
sabbatical year, but I have seemed to myself justi- 
fied in so doing. I have always thought it a mis- 
take, on more than one account, for a man to con- 
fine himself to the narrow range of any occupation 
or profession, and I have acted on this conviction. 
I believe that it was a good thing for me, both as a 
man and as a teacher, to take this opportunity to 
become better acquainted with four of the peoples 
of Europe, the trend of their thinking, especially 
on the subject of theology, and even their achieve- 
ments in the fine arts. It broadened my vision, 
enabling me to see things without prejudice and 
furnishing me with a fund of illustration on which 
I have drawn times without number. 



ERRORS AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS 

In the fall of 1892 I returned to my work. I 
need hardly say that I did not come back the same 
man that I was when I received my leave of absence. 
I had, during the year, not only reviewed the sub- 
ject of the origin of the books of the Old Testament 
and thoroughly tested my views concerning them, 
but given much additional thought to certain doc- 
trines which were popularly supposed to be en- 
dangered by biblical criticism; the result being 
the conviction that the critical method was sound 
and its findings substantially correct, also that it 
was dangerous to the doctrines in question only in 
so far as they were based on incomplete or mistaken 
data. Moreover, while writing the books on which 
I had been engaged, by the practice of great care 
in translation as well as in original composition I 
had acquired greater facihty in expressing myself 
and begun to feel increased pleasure in so doing. 
In other words, I found myself equipped as I had 
never before been for the effective pursuit of my 
vocation. 

It was well that this was the case, for I had ahead 

118 



ERRORS AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS 119 

of me the most strenuous and critical years of my 
life; years, also, critical for the Methodist Church. 
I had to justify myself to the students for any 
change that I purposed to make in my teaching. 
The extent to which I could see my way with the 
Pentateuch, or more precisely, the Hexateuch, ap- 
pears in the supplementary chapter in my Amos 
devoted to his relation to these books; where, in- 
stead of trying to maintain that D in some form 
was older than the oldest of the writing prophets, 
I questioned whether he was acquainted with any 
of them. This was a pretty clear indication that I 
had learned to "endure" the more liberal of the two 
theories concerning the origin of the so-called 
*'Books of Moses." There was another indication 
more positive in my translation of Piepenbring's 
Theologie, for Piepenbring, as I have already 
stated, was a pupil of Reuss, and Reuss was one of 
the earliest exponents of this theory, and the nat- 
ural inference from the fact that I had translated 
the book would be that I belonged to the same 
school. 

My task was rendered even more difficult that it 
had hitherto been by the activity of certain would- 
be defenders of the faith, who, stirred, by the 
Eriggs case, flooded the denominational papers 
with denunciation of biblical critics and went about, 
not only inciting the conferences to pass resolutions 



120 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

expressive of lack of confidence in our Theological 
School, but warning or threatening candidates for 
the ministry who were inclined to come to Boston. 
This crusade, to be sure, did not have the effect de- 
signed and expected ; that is, it did not so seriously 
affect the attendance at the School. In fact the size 
of the classes for the next five years, to judge from 
the numbers graduated, was about fifteen per cent, 
greater than in the five preceding; but the men, 
coming as they often did, against the advice of their 
friends, could not feel quite free from apprehen- 
sion, lest they should have made a serious mistake. 
It did not take me long to decide what course to 
pursue in the circumstances. It was, to present 
my views, especially so far as they were to any ex- 
tent new, with all possible clearness and cogency, 
and to insist, as I had learned from my own ex- 
perience, that these views so far from being incon- 
sistent with and injurious to faith and piety, were 
calculated to establish one in genuine religion. I 
followed this course, and some of the students, even 
among those without a college training, readily 
responded by taking the general results of criticism 
on trial. For others it was not so easy to change 
their minds. Indeed there were those to whom it 
meant a struggle as desperate as that which pre- 
ceded their conversion. One man who came to me 
for private assistance told me that he had walked 



ERRORS AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS 121 

his room all night in an agony lest he should yield 
and lose his soul in consequence. I am happy to 
be able to say that in such cases the outcome was 
usually correspondingly joyous. When the suf- 
ferer became willing to say with all his heart, with 
my friend, "I am willing to believe anything that 
is true," he was soon on his way rejoicing. 

This was the state of things in my department 
from 1892 onward for three years. The same ques- 
tions and objections had to be answered every year 
because every year I had to present to new Middlers 
and Seniors the subjects that made us trouble. I 
had hoped that with time the influence of those who 
had "come through" their difficulties would gradu- 
ally relieve the tension. That it did not, I ex- 
plained as the effect of outside propaganda. It 
did not occur to me to suspect that any of my 
colleagues, however conservative, would embarrass 
me. I was on too good terms with them, and re- 
spected them too sincerely, to believe that they 
would do so intentionally. None of them did; yet 
in March, 1895, the uneasiness among the students 
became so widespread and serious, that thirty-eight 
of them, from the two upper classes, presented 
to the President a petition in which they com- 
plained of my teachings and asked for an investiga- 
tion. 

This movement affected me very deeply : not with 



122 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

resentment, for the young men took pains to assure 
me of their regard for me personally, and, with one 
or two exceptions, they showed by their conduct 
during the investigation that they meant what they 
said; but I was humiliated by the discovery that, 
strenuously as I had striven, I had fallen short of 
my aim as a teacher. Therefore, although I de- 
clined to appear before the petitioners as a body in 
my own defense, I offered to see those who had for- 
mulated the charges against me personally in my 
study, in fact declined to make any reply to their 
charges until I had discussed with each of them his 
individual statement. 

Some of them at first hesitated about accepting 
my invitation ; but they all finally came and I cor- 
rected their statements in so far as they needed 
correction and explained more fully what I really 
believed and intended to teach. They accused me 
of being a Unitarian, because, as they more 
specifically alleged, I denied the miraculous birth 
of Jesus and his omniscience in the flesh ; also that 
his death was necessary to the salvation of the 
world, or belief in his divinity to that of the individ- 
ual soul. In reply I said with reference to the 
first of these charges that I had never made a 
positive declaration eoncerning the subject, ex- 
cept that, if, as I knew some did, I ever felt obliged 
to doubt or deny the historicity of the story of the 



ERRORS AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS 123 

nativity, it would not disturb my faith in Jesus 
as, in a unique sense, the Son of God and the Savior 
of the world. 

The second charge, that I denied the omniscience 
of Jesus, I unhesitatingly admitted. I had been 
forced into this position when I denied the Mosaic 
authorship of the Pentateuch. My opponents 
quoted Jesus and, when, disdaining the devices by 
which this point is sometimes met, I replied that he 
seemed to have shared the opinion of the Jews of 
his time, that Moses was its author, they clinched 
their argument, as they^upposed, by asking, "Well, 
doesn't that settle the matter?" Of course, there 
was nothing for me to say but "By no means" and 
quote the Master's own words to show that he did 
not claim to be omniscient. I tried to make these 
young men see that, as an honest scholar, I had 
no alternative. 

I had no great difficulty with the remaining 
charges. In fact, these witnesses against me, if 
they had carefuUy read one another's statements, 
would have found their answers in some of the 
very utterances attributed to me. Thus, one of 
them reported me as saying with reference to the 
necessity of believing in the divinity of Jesus for 
salvation, "Christ never asked anyone to believe in 
his divinity; he asked them to believe in him"; by 
which, of course, I meant to emphasize the dif- 



124 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

ference between intellectual assent and religious 
faith. With the other matter they would have 
had no difficulty if they had taken the advice another 
said I gave them to "consider how men were saved 
before Christ was crucified," the reference being 
especially to the saints of the Old Testament and 
the disciples he made during his ministry. I 
taught that Abraham found acceptance with God 
through submission and obedience, and the disciples 
through faith, not in a dead Christ, but in the 
Christ who, in the face of death, prayed, *'Father, 
if thou be willing, remove this cup from me ; never- 
theless, not my will, but thine, be done." 

After these interviews I notified the President 
that I was ready to present my case, whereupon he 
appointed a meeting of the Standing Committee 
for the School of Theology to which I was invited. 
I first read a paper in which I discussed the stu- 
dents' statements, correcting any errors made and 
explaining the bearing of correctly reported utter- 
ances which had been misunderstood, and maintain- 
ing my position on each of the points in controversy. 
I concluded with a statement of my own concern- 
ing the person of Jesus, as follows : 

Jesus was "the Son of God," in whom dwelt "all 
the fullness of the Godhead bodily," and as such, 
the crowning expression of God's eternal purpose 
of self -revelation; so that through him, presented, 



ERRORS AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS 125 

not in an abstract formula merely, but in the con- 
crete beauty and majesty of his unique personality, 
we learn what God is and what are his requirements 
of us. On the other hand, he was "the Son of Man," 
"the second Adam," the perfect representative of 
humanity, and, as such, in his sinless life and volun- 
tary death met the requirements of the divine holi- 
ness and furnished us an object of faith through 
whom those who, not merely give an intellectual 
assent to his claims so far as they can understand 
them, but enter into a vital fellowship of his spirit, 
are saved, receiving the forgiveness of their sins, 
becoming partakers of the divine nature, and in- 
heriting the blessings here and hereafter as sons 
of the Most High. Those who are denied a knowl- 
edge of the world's Redeemer are saved in accord- 
ance with the gracious purpose of God on condition 
of walking in the light vouched them. This is what 
I now hold, what I have for years believed, and I 
have never consciously taught anything to the 
contrary. 

In the examination which followed I freely ad- 
mitted that, although I had followed with the 
deepest interest the results of my work, I was not 
aware of the dissatisfaction behind this movement, 
and, therefore, had not in the excitement of dis- 
cussion expressed myself as carefully as I ought 
to have done under the circumstances. 



126 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

The Committee next held a conference with the 
petitioners at which, I suppose, my paper was read 
and discussed. They then adopted a report in 
which they endorsed my claim that I had been 
"thoroughly misunderstood," and, in view of my 
determination in the future to give to my teaching 
"a positiveness and iteration" that would "preclude 
the recurrence of any like misunderstanding," com- 
mended me to the confidence of bewildered stu- 
dents who, ''from the standpoint of New Testa- 
ment teaching," were wrestling "with the problems 
of history and prophecy presented by the present 
state of Old Testament studies"; and the report 
when presented at a mass meeting of the students 
was imanimously adopted. 

The outcome gave general satisfaction. I my- 
self felt that, in spite of the mild criticism passed 
upon my methods, I had been vindicated and that 
I could rely on the sympathy and support of the 
Committee, and therefore of the Trustees, in the 
future. I was confirmed in my confidence and 
deeply touched, when one of the more conservative, 
the next time I saw him, put his arm about me and 
said : "Mitchell, I don't know anything about criti- 
cism and all that, but so long as you teach what 
you believe to be true in the spirit that you've thus 
far shown, I'll stand by you." I do not need to say 
that this and other like tokens of faith in me did 



ERRORS AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS 127 

more to restrain me from miwise speech or action 
than all the denmiciations of my most active and 
influential critics. 

The Committee found me the unintentional oc- 
casion of the disturbance that I have described; 
which implied that, if I had been better informed, I 
might have prevented it. I did not contest their 
finding, for, at the time, as I have admitted, I was 
of the same opinion. I now know that I was not 
altogether to blame, for some time after the matter 
was settled a former member of the Faculty wrote 
to me, saying that he felt that he ought at least to 
share the responsibility for what happened. The 
letter is so noble and generous that I feel war- 
ranted in quoting from it, especially since it will 
show that he no more intended to produce disaffec- 
tion among the students than I did. This is his 
statement : 

"I really had no intentional connection with the 
rising of the students. It was no part of my plan 
to try to disturb you ; for I had made up my mind 
seriously that you, in the fitness of things, were 
the man to stay in the Boston Faculty. I did not 
even know that the students had taken a stand 
until it was imder way. . . . Not only so, but, 
when they told me of their plan, I said that with 
such charges they would not, and could not, make 
their case. Yet I think that I really made the 
trouble (but not purposely) ; for it was my being 



128 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

there, and talking, and teaching, and acting as I 
did which created the situation in which an up- 
rising was possible." 

It seems, as I have learned from one of the peti- 
tioners, that, while I was discussing the Pentateuch, 
Professor Curtis was lecturing on the incarnation 
and the atonement, and some of the students re- 
peated to him disjointed remarks which I had 
made. He, being in a polemical mood, declared 
them heretical, of course without mentioning my 
name, and the zeal of his hearers was kindled by 
his indignation. If I had known all that at the 
time, I should probably have tried to come to an 
understanding with him ; but I might not have suc- 
ceeded. When a year later he resigned his pro- 
fessorship I tried in vain to persuade him to remain 
with us. He gave as his reason for refusing, that 
he could not go on teaching systematic the- 
ology until he had given at least two years to the 
further study of the subject. We were all. Faculty 
and students, sorry to lose him, for he was a man 
of noble spirit and an inspiring teacher. 



THE WIDER FIELD 

I do not need to say that I was intensely occu- 
pied during the period of the preceding chapter. 
I did not, however, forget or neglect the mission- 
ary work in which the students were engaged. In 
fact, I gave it more time and thought than for- 
merly, because it had taken a new form, and ac- 
quired gi^eatly increased interest and importance. 
When I went abroad for my sabbatical year it 
consisted largely in participation in meetings of the 
evangelistic kind. When I returned, B.ve or six 
young men, under the leadership of Hollin H. 
Walker, had established a centre at the head of 
Poplar Street, where, with the help of many other 
students, they began a movement for the moral 
and religious betterment of the West End. On 
the first of January, 1893, the headquarters were 
moved to what was thereafter called the Ep worth 
League House, in Hull Street, at the jSTorth End, 
and the organization was called the University 
Settlement. In June of that year I published the 
record of its first six months: sermons preached, 
111; meetings at missions, lodging-houses, etc., 
175; visits made, about 2500; bouquets carried to 

129 



130 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

the old, sick, etc., about 400 ; garments given to the 
needy, about 400; meals sent to those in want, 
about 200; to say nothing of the clubs and classes 
in which scores of children were taught and trained. 
This practical application of Christianity strongly 
appealed to me; also to the students, to whom it 
furnished invaluable training in the art of winning 
others as well as a means of expression for their 
religious life. The work was so wisely managed 
that it was very successful, measured, not only by 
its direct results, but by its influence on the com- 
munity. At first it was opposed by both the Jews 
and the Catholics; but it was not long before a 
Cathohc priest whose mother had been one of its 
beneficiaries was saying that it was the most Christ- 
like work he had ever seen, and the Jews, with the 
approval of their Rabbis, were sending their chil- 
dren to be taught their Scriptures at the Settle- 
ment. 

At first, as will have been noticed, the emphasis 
was naturally put upon evangelism; but, as time 
passed, more and more effort was applied in social 
and educational ways. This change did not please 
Methodists generally. When an appeal was made 
to them for help they were apt to ask how many 
conversions there had been; how many Catholics 
had become Protestants and how many Jews 
Christians. We, however, who were on the ground 



THE WIDER HELD 131 

had learned that statistics concerning evangelistic 
effort in the slums were very unrehable; that the 
number of genuine and permanent conversions 
among adults were comparatively small and the 
value of such accessions often trifling, while the 
boys and girls were much more responsive and, 
under the guidance and stimulus of the Settlement, 
capable of surprising development. We therefore 
plead for, and labored with, the young people, 
some of whom we have lived to see among the most 
reputable men and women of Boston. 

The University Settlement was a pioneer insti- 
tution, the first of its kind in Methodism and one 
of the first in the country. It did a great work 
for the North End, and, although it no longer ex- 
ists as an institution, its influence is still felt. Its 
ministry to the community is perpetuated by the 
Woman's Home Missionary Society, on the same 
site, through the Medical Mission and affiliated ac- 
tivities. This, however, is not all. Many young 
men and women, inspired by the example of that 
devoted teacher, Harriet J. Coke, who made re- 
ligion so attractive that the children who knew her 
wanted to be pious, are following her as she fol- 
lowed the Master. Some have made it the busi- 
ness of their lives and become experts in their 
calling. The most notable of them, the Rev. E. 
J. Helms, has remained in Boston, and, by his 



132 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

quenchless faith and tireless energy, made Morgan 
Memorial a cosmopolitan centre for religious and 
philanthropic work and fulfilled the dream that 
made him and his associates call their modest ven- 
ture at the North End of the University Settlement 
by actually bringing this greater enterprise under 
the segis of Boston University. 

I believed in the Settlement and its methods. 
I said in an article on The Redemption of the 
Slums, published in the Methodist Review just 
before the students brought their complaint: 

"The success of the institutional method, or the 
hand-to-hand grapple with vice and misery, is no 
longer in question. ... In the first place, a vast 
amount of misery is relieved. The sick are nursed, 
the hungry fed, the homeless sheltered, and the 
naked furnished with clothing. Those who are 
handicapped by ignorance or any similar disability, 
are as far as possible relieved of their burdens. 
Thus, hundreds of foreigners are taught to write 
their own, and to speak the English language; 
while almost as many women are instmcted in the 
arts of the housewife. Multitudes of children are 
gathered into clubs and classes, where they learn 
all sorts of valuable things, not the least important 
of which are consideration for one another and ad- 
miration for the unselfishness of their leaders and 
instructors. Nor is this all. The agents through 
whom these blessings are distributed are first of all 
disciples of Jesus. What they do they do in his 
name. Hence it is natural that their ministry in 



THE WIDER FIELD 133 

temporal^ things should prove a preparation for 
the Gospel. . . . Here is an opportunity for the 
Methodist Church. Will it accept the divine call 
and lend a hand in the movement that is upon us? 
Or will it fall into the rear of the column led by the 
Salvation Army and lose the right, hitherto its 
glory, to be called the Church of the Masses and 
the especial friend of the unfortunate?" ^ 

The article from which I have just quoted was 
one of several produced during this period. I had 
begun to do this sort of work some time before, 
first for Zion's Herald, the Andover Review, and 
the American Journal of Theology. I had also 
prepared a paper on the Higher Criticism, and 
read it, I think in 1889, before the Preachers' 
Meeting in New York. In it, after defining the 
subject and discussing the principles on which 
criticism was properly conducted, I made my first 
public statement of my position with reference to 
the so-called "Books of Moses." It was very frank, 
but very modest and conservative ; therefore, in my 
innocence I expected that it would be well re- 
ceived ; but to my surprise Dr. Mendenhall was in- 
vited to reply and cheered to the echo in the most 
violent and extravagant condemnation of the crit- 
ics and all their works. I was naturally disap- 

1 1 ought in self-defense to state a provoking fact with reference 
to the article quoted. I put my soul into it, but the Editor whose 
delicate ( !) taste seems to have been offended by the baldness of 
my style, substituted for all my Fs his timid editorial we's, thus rob- 
bing it of the quality which did most to make it worth publishing. 



134 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

pointed, but I was somewhat comforted when, after 
the meeting, half a dozen of the younger men as- 
sured me of their sympathy and took me with them 
to a very good dinner. 

I had a similar experience, when, in 1893, I gave 
a lecture on Inspiration in the Old Testament 
at a Summer School of Philosophy on Staten Is- 
land, under the management of Dr. Sims, some 
time Chancellor of Nashville University. Then it 
was Professor B. B. Warfield, of the Presbyterian 
School of Allegheny, who was pitted against me. 

I had a rather more encouraging reception the 
next time I went to speak in New York. It was, 
I think, in 1893, at the invitation of the New York 
East Conference, and my subject was Profit and 
Loss: a Reckoning with Biblical Criticism, The 
following description, from a New York daily, of 
the discussion that followed my effort, will indicate 
how crude in those days was much of the theology 
even of some of our prominent preachers. 

"Professor Mitchell's lecture stirred up a good 
deal of excitement among his hearers, and as soon 
as he had finished a dozen clergymen were on their 
feet to question him." 

" *Did I understand you to endorse the doctrine 
that all our noble thoughts are really as much the 
word of God as the inspired Book?' asked the Rev. 
John Parker." 



THE WIDER FIELD 135 

" 'We are bound to accept anything that is true,' 
replied Professor Mitchell." 

" 'Did Christ not accept the teachings of the 
Old Testament as they stood when he found them?' 
asked the Rev. Thomas Stevenson." 

" 'Christ corrected the teachings of the Old Tes- 
tament,' replied Professor Mitchell, 'in at least one 
particular. He abrogated the laws of Moses re- 
lating to divorce, and thereby showed that he did 
not consider the Old Testament infallible.' " 

" 'I always gave you credit for being entertain- 
ing, if not convincing,' said the Rev. Alexander 
McAllister amid much laughter." 

" 'How would you interpret Paul's statement, 
that all Scripture is inspired?' " 

" 'Inspiration,' replied Professor Mitchell, 'does 
not imply infallibility.' " 

" 'Of what use, then, is inspiration?' asked Mr. 
McAllister." 

" 'Inspiration uplifts men,' replied Professor 
Mitchell, 'but not above humanity.' " 

" 'If the Bible is not inerrant,' asked Mr. 
McAllister, 'what parts are infalUble?' " 

" 'That is a question to be determined,' was Pro- 
fessor Mitchell's reply." 

" 'If we have no infallible standard, we may as 
well have no standard at all,' declared Mr. 
McAllister." 

" 'Who will assert,' asked Professor Mitchell, 
*that it is necessary to be infallible to go to 
heaven?' " 

" 'When the Bible,' said Mr. McAllister, 'speaks 
of morals and religion it is infallible; but, when 
it treats of science and other matters, we don't 



136 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

place any reliance on it. We never did. (Laugh- 
ter) . But in ethics it is infallible.' " 

"The Rev. Rhey Thompson asked Mr. Mc- 
Allister if the one hundred and ninth psalm was 
infallible in its teachings on our treatment of our 
enemies." 

" 'In my interpretation of it/ answered Mr. 
McAUister, 'it is.' " 

" 'How am I to be assured that I have the truth?' 
asked Mr. McAlhster of Professor Mitchell." 

" 'Does a squirrel, after it has cracked a nut, 
eat the shell or the kernel?' Professor Mitchell 
replied." 

" 'Suppose he dies of old age while he is gnaw- 
ing at it?' suggested some one at the rear of the 
church: at which there was great laughter at Mr. 
McAllister's expense." 

" 'How did the people who listened to the Sermon 
on the Mount know that the Teacher of all time 
had arrived among them?' asked Mr. Thompson." 

" 'By that spark of God which is in every man 
born into the world.' " 

" 'This answer was greeted with applause and 
Mr. Thompson then moved that a vote of thanks 
be extended to Professor Mitchell." 

"Dr. Stevenson was opposed to the vote of 
thanks, because he said, the faith of the clergy- 
men present had not been built up by Professor 
Mitchell's lecture." 

"Dr. Robert Cook said he did not agi^ee with 
Professor Mitchell, but would certainly vote in 
favor of thanking him for his lecture." 

"A standing vote was then taken, and Mr. 
Thompson's motion was unanimously carried." 



THE WIDER FIELD 137 

It is evident from this report that the opposition 
to the higher criticism in New York had become 
less violent since my first lectm-e in that city; but 
lest it should be inferred that this milder attitude 
was very widespread in Methodism, I wiU mention 
that about this time I was invited to lecture at the 
Maine Conference, and, after the lecture, the Con- 
ference voted, not to thank me, but to censure the 
Committee by whom I was invited. The Com- 
mittee, of course, were indignant; but I did not 
mind. I knew that it was not the first time that 
zeal for the faith had produced a short crop of 
fruits of the Spirit. 

I must not leave • this period without saying 
something about my relations with the Methodist 
weekhes. Zion's Herald was the only one to which 
I was a regular contributor. Its editor allowed 
me to say what I would, in reason, without always 
taking the trouble to provide the reader with a 
ready antidote. He held that there were critics 
and critics, and, whatever I said or omitted to say, 
treated me as one of the constructive class. Of 
course, he was prejudiced in my favor, but I 
should have made no serious objection if he had not 
put Sayce and Hommel, who had no standing 
among biblical scholars, in the same class. My 
actual position was set forth in an article in the 
Zion's Herald of January 24, 1894, entitled The 



138 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Pentateuchal Question, in which I stated the vari- 
ous views with reference to the origin of the Penta- 
teuch and plead for tolerance, docility, and pa- 
tience, while scholars were trying, if possible, to 
determine when and by whom its five books were 
really written. 

I got a wider hearing for a more complete state- 
ment, when, later in the same year, the Editor of 
the Christian Advocate invited me to write a series 
of articles for his paper. He said he felt that the 
time had come for a thorough discussion of the re- 
sults of biblical criticisms and that I was the man 
to present them; but that, since the validity of 
these findings were still widely questioned, he 
thought it only fair that the objectors, also, should 
he heard. He had, therefore, he stated, asked two 
well-known conservatives, Professor Green of 
Princeton and Dr. Behrends of Brooklyn, to rep- 
resent them. At first I shrank from undertaking 
so serious a task, but finally, in view of the possi- 
bihty of helping our people over what may be con- 
sidered a serious crisis, I consented on the follow- 
ing understanding: I was to write four articles, 
Dr. Behrends three, and Professor Green one; 
neither of us was to see the others' articles; and 
mine were to be published precisely as I wrote 
them, without note or comment from the editor. 



THE WIDER FIELD 

within six months of the date of publication. 
These stipulations seemed to ensure fair play by- 
all parties. 

I took for my general subject The History of 
the Old Testament, and for the subordinate titles, 
Introduction, The Pentateuch, The Book of 
Isaiah and The Book of Daniel. My first ap- 
peared October 4, 1894. In it I first explained 
the meaning of Introduction as a branch of Exe- 
getical Theology, and its value as a preparation 
for the study of the Old Testament, with illustra- 
tions; then stated and discussed the conditions un- 
der which it might be made really and permanently 
helpful, namely, research and discussion, these be- 
ing the only means whereby progress in knowledge 
of the origin and history of these Scriptures ever 
had been or ever would be made, concluding with 
a warning against attempting to silence biblical 
scholars or ignoring the results of their labors. 

In my second paper I explained the origin of 
the various theories concerning the Pentateuch in 
successive attempts to account for the repetitions 
and discrepancies which force themselves upon the 
notice of the thoughtful readers ; described the four 
sources of the Documentary Hypothesis; pre- 
sented the evidence on the age of these sources, in 
the relation between the Pentateuch and Joshua, in 



140 POR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

the five books themselves, and in the other books of 
the Old Testament; and finally answered the ob- 
jections usually made to the dates to which the 
sources and the composite work are severally re- 
ferred,— for J 850 B. c, for E 750, for D 650, for 
P 500, and for JEDP 444. In reply to the last 
of these objections I said, to conclude: "The New 
Testament presents no such alternative as 'Christ 
or Criticism,' and it is as unfair as it is cruel by 
this means to quench the intellectual life of timid 
believers or force their bolder brethren into seem- 
ing hostihty to our Lord and Master." 

In my third paper I compared the style of the 
parts of Isa. 1-39 which are generally recognized 
as products of his day with that of chapters 40-66, 
then the historical allusions and the leading ideas, 
especially the ideal king of the first part with the 
servant of Yahweh of the second, closing with brief 
replies to those objections sometimes made to the 
dual authorship of the book. 

In my fourth paper I first called attention to 
the place taken by Daniel in the Hebrew Scrip- 
tures, and argued that, since the Jews placed it, 
not among the prophetical books, but among the 
so-called "Writings," they did not reckon its au- 
thor among the prophets. Then I showed that in 
the narrative sections the author betrayed an ig- 



THE WIDER FIELD 141 

norance of the period of which he was writing, best 
explained by supposing that he belonged to a much 
later generation; while in the parts which have the 
form of prophecy he described with such detail and 
correctness until he neared the end of the reign of 
Antiochus Epiphanes that one was forced to the 
conclusion that thus far he was reciting more re- 
cent history, and only attempted genuine prophecy 
in his mistaken prediction concerning the fate of 
the blasphemous monarch. I maintained, there- 
fore, that this book must have been written about 
165 B. c. I refused, however, to admit that it was 
a fraud, insisting that it was messianic in the sense 
that it marked the stage to which the messianic 
idea had been developed in the days of Antiochus 
Epiphanes. I ought at the same time to have 
claimed that it was evidently written to teach the 
Jews loyalty to their God and faith in his mighty 
power, and was doubtless a factor only less im- 
portant than the great soldier Judas Maccabeus in 
their struggle for independence. 

These papers were published one after another 
in successive issues of the Advocate. Then came 
the three by Dr. Behrends and, finally, one by Pro- 
fessor Green. No ; not finally, for the next week, 
to my surprise, — since I supposed that one by him 
meant only one, — there appeared another, and so 
on until his contributions numbered seven. This 



142 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

seemed a violation of our agreement ; and a protest 
seemed in order: but, not being able to claim that 
the Professor's last six shots had done any damage, 
I decided not to waste words on a technicality. 



ZEAL WITHOUT KNOWLEDGE 

The investigation of 1895 left me in a compara- 
tively favorable position, for, although the Com- 
mittee had felt obliged to report that I had not al- 
ways been as careful and explicit as I might have 
been, under the circumstances, they did not object 
to the substance of my teaching as I explained it. 
The action of the students, also, indicated that they 
were content, in view of my readiness to admit im- 
perfection of method, that I should be unhampered 
in the presentation of what I beheve to be the truth 
about the Scriptures. I, naturally, therefore, 
thought that I had heard the last of questions con- 
cerning my orthodoxy from members of the Uni- 
versity. There was, in fact, quiet along our hues 
for some time. There were also indications of a 
better feehng in the church, and I began to hope 
that it would weather the disturbance occasioned 
by the new biblical learning, and I should be per- 
mitted to assist in the accomplishment of this re- 
sult. I was encouraged in this hope, when, in 
1897, the year in which I pubhshed my commen- 
tary on the first twelve chapters of Isaiah, the 
Pittsburg Congress was called and Professors 

143 



144 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Bowne, Taylor, Baldwin and myself were chosen 
to represent Boston University. As the make-up 
of our delegation would indicate it was a large and 
widely representative gathering. There were in 
all thirty-seven members. Six of these, three bish- 
ops and three other officials, were there to speak 
for the Church at large. The greater number 
(22) were heads of educational institutions or 
teachers in them; but there were nine prominent 
pastors, among whom was the Rev. Daniel Dor- 
chester, the President, in whose church the Con- 
gress was held. There were no very young men, 
but the majority were liberal in their general atti- 
tude, and although there were strong conservatives, 
I could not but feel that I was among friends. 
My subject was The New Old Testament, my 
aim being to show that criticism, so far from impair- 
ing the value of the Hebrew Scriptures, had really 
strengthened their claim for appreciation from the 
literary, the doctrinal, and the religious standpoint. 
In conclusion I said: *'The outcome can be 
summed up in a few words. Investigation has 
taken from us a collection of books that we did not 
know how to read and given it back to us in a form 
in which it must command greater interest and ad- 
miration; it has taken from us a mass of teaching 
that we could not thoroughly understand and given 
it back to us so arranged that we can at length 



ZEAL WITHOUT KNOWLEDGE 145 

trace its origin and history; it has taken from us 
a means of grace that we did not always know how 
to use and given it back to us with the key to its 
highest efficacy. If, however, this is really the ef- 
fect of criticism, what ought to be our attitude to- 
ward it and those by whom it has been conducted? 
Hear the words of a parable: A woman came to 
Rabbi Jose, saying, 'Was it not wrong for God to 
take from Adam, while he slept, the rib from which 
he made Eve?' The Rabbi answered, *if some 
one should secretly take from you an ounce of sil- 
ver and openly give you in retiu'n a pound of gold, 
would you call him a thief?' 

I thoroughly appreciated the opportunity thus 
offered to reach the thinking men of the Church, 
for I saw the possibility of winning through them 
a wider tolerance for modern ideas concerning the 
Bible; but my heart was with our students and I 
gave them from day to day the best of which I was 
capable. They were almost to a man very respon- 
sive. Indeed, when they had occasion to express 
themselves they were sometimes embarrassingly 
laudatory. I presume this tendency to extrava- 
gance in my friends to some extent accounts for 
the bitterness of those who refused to accept the 
general estimate of my work. There were but few 
of them ; hence they could not, as did the complain- 
ants of 1895, claim to voice a sentiment or an opin- 



146 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

ion prevalent in the School. There was this differ- 
ence, also, between this movement and the preced- 
ing, that it was not impulsive and defensive, but 
deliberate and aggressive. From the first the two 
or three who led and controlled it lost no opportun- 
ity to raise an objection or otherwise interrupt me 
and seriously interfere with the discussion of the 
subject in hand. They sometimes carried their ob- 
structive tactics so far that I was obliged to limit 
debate in the classroom, always, however, explain- 
ing that I would give them any amount of my time 
at home; at which they would become angry and 
use language utterly unbecoming in a student. 
Finally one of them brought a list of twelve ques- 
tions into the class and demanded that I then and 
there unequivocally answer them. When I refused 
to take the time of the class for that purpose he 
became so offensive that I took the matter to the 
President, and thus myself precipitated another in- 
vestigation. 

This was in May, 1899. A little later the au- 
thor of the questionnaire above mentioned, with 
five other Seniors and three from the Middle Class 
brought a complaint against me, fortified by per- 
sonal statements of seven of their number, also the 
individual statements on which the complaint of 
1895 was based: these last, not only without the 
permission, but against the protests, of the signers. 



ZEAL WITHOUT KNOWLEDGE 147 

I am not going to reproduce the whole of this 
paper, but it seems necessary to quote the para- 
graph which presents the main charges. Here it is : 

"The impression made upon us is that his teach- 
ings are essentially Unitarian. He denies the 
omniscience of Christ. He holds that we are not 
compelled to accept the statements of Christ with 
reference to the Old Testament, and that no argu- 
ment can be based upon them. He states that be- 
lief in the deity of Jesus Christ is not necessary to 
salvation, and that a man can be saved through 
believing in other men without a knowledge of, 
or teaching about, Christ. That it was not a part 
of God's redemptive plan that Christ should die 
for the salvation of the race. That the vicarious 
sufferings of Christ were not necessary to the sal- 
vation of men. That Christ's death was simply 
the culminating act of his life. He holds that no 
prophet of the Old Testament knew anything 
about the person of Christ. That the prophets 
did not prophesy of any event not having its causes 
in the local conditions of their own time. He mini- 
mizes or calls in question the miraculous elements 
of the Old Testament. He treats as mythical the 
persons and history of the antediluvian patriarchs 
and questions the existence of Noah and Isaac. 
He holds that the Sabbath is not of divine origin. 
He accepts and teaches the general position of the 
Wellhausen school with reference to the Penta- 
teuch to the exclusion of all others. His teachings 
with reference to the authorship and credibility of 
most of the books of the Old Testament are de- 
structive rather than constructive." 



148 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

These charges are so nearly those of 1895 that 
it does not seem necessary to give even the sub- 
stance of the paper in which I answered them. It 
was handed to the President on the twenty-ninth 
of May, the date on which he was to meet the com- 
plainants, Ibut not, unfortmiately, in time for the 
meeting. It was the fifth of July before copies of 
it were delivered to the interested parties, but, as 
two of the complainants had by that time with- 
drawn their names and the rest had agreed to await 
the next meeting of the Trustees, the delay was 
not of serious consequence. When, however, the 
Standing Committee, after considering their 
charges and my reply, supplemented by an oral 
statement, on the twenty-third of October recom- 
mended me for re-election, one of the leaders, who 
was stiU in the School, sent a copy of the charges 
to the Board of Bishops, for the purpose of pre- 
venting my confirmation, if the Trustees, in spite 
of their protest, decided to give me a fourth term 
of five years; which they did unanimously on the 
thirteenth of November. On the same date the 
hostiles were notified that they were expected to 
remain, but that, if they did, they must abstain 
from further agitation of the matter then pending. 
Thereupon several of them gave notice of their 
withdrawal, but the Faculty, after various attempts 
to bring them to a better mind, followed them with 



ZEAL WITHOUT KNOWLEDGE 149 

a sentence of suspension. I need hardly say that 
I had no part in this or any other action taken by 
the Faculty with reference to these students, but 
went about my work and treated them as long as 
any of them remained in my classes, as if nothing 
had happened. 

In the above recital I have drawn from both a 
pamphlet published by my accusers and a state- 
ment of the Faculty. I will quote from them to 
show what was the state of my case when it now 
went to the Bishops for decision. The "Declara- 
tion of Principles" by which the former justified 
their withdrawal closed as f oUows : 

"We, therefore, as Methodist preachers and as 
ambassadors of Jesus Christ, in loyalty to our 
Church, which we beKeve, was reared for a world- 
wide evangelism, and in conformity to the behest 
of our consciences, feel that we cannot endorse the 
re-election of Professor Mitchell by remaining 
longer in this institution: that an acquiescence on 
our part and a tacit avowal of cessation from fur- 
ther action in this matter would be to compromise 
our integrity, stifle our sense of duty, and to make 
still more difficult and improbable any hope of 
rehef for the Church outside or correction within 
the School." 

Compare the statement of the Faculty: 

"In concluding this brief history the colleagues 



150 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

of Professor Mitchell make the following declar- 
ations : 

1. We are unanimously of the opinion that, but 
for outside instigation and countenance, the con- 
fidence of most, if not all, of the disturbed students 
could have been regained, their zeal made more 
intelligent and brotherly, their views of revelation 
and redemption brought into closer harmony with 
truly scriptural teaching, and all brought to honor- 
able graduation and fruitful ministry, with only 
love and loyalty to Church and School alike. 

2. From intimate knowledge of the views, spirit, 
and past work of Professor Mitchell we feel certain 
that he has taught nothing contrary to the doctrinal 
standards or Highest spiritual ideals of the Metho- 
dist Episcopal Church; and this we say after giving 
all due attention to what his accusers have alleged 
against him. 

3. Finally, reviewing all that has passed, it is 
our deliberate opinion and unanimous judgment 
that the authorities of the School will mistake the 
will of God and commit an error of far-reaching 
consequence, if, influenced by the clamor of the 
seceding students and their allies, they deprive the 
rising ministry of our Church, of the inspiration 
and aid of a teacher of the eminent ability and 
loyalty of Professor Mitchell, whose only devi- 
ations from traditional conceptions of Biblical 
authorship and interpretation are such as he be- 
lieves to be needful for the better defense of trini- 
tarian orthodoxy and helpful in the propagation 
of that vigorous type of evangelical life histori- 
cally associated with the name of Wesley." 

No one who has read the preceding pages will 



ZEAL WITHOUT KNOWLEDGE 151 

be surprised that my standing in the theological 
world at large was only improved by the publicity 
given to my teachings or overlook the evidence to 
this effect in the fact that in the summer of 1899 
I was invited to give a course of lectures on Old 
Testament Prophecy at the Harvard Summer 
School of Theology, where it was my privilege to 
speak to a goodly number of young ministers of 
various denominations on The Beginnings of Pro- 
phecy, Amos and Hose a, and The False Prophets, 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 

My case was now in the hands of the Bishops. 
The change gave rise to the question whether it 
was necessary or admissible for me to change my 
method of defense. Thus far I considered my- 
self responsible in the first instance to the Trustees 
of the University, with whom I had usually com- 
municated through the President. I now felt that, 
since I had satisfied them of my loyalty to my ob- 
ligations as a teacher and they had re-elected me, 
I was their man and it was theirs to protect me in 
my position. When, therefore, I rewrote my an- 
swer to the charges, which had now been sent to the 
Bishops, I addressed it to President Warren and 
left it with him, as the representative of the Trus- 
tees, to bring it to the attention of the Bishops as a 
part of the evidence of my fitness for the chair 
which for sixteen years I had been filling. The 
Trustees accepted this view of our relation and, 
when later I went to Washington to read m.y pa- 
per, my expenses were paid by the University. I 
might have taken a different course. I might, 
making the campaign against me a personal mat- 
ter, have questioned the jurisdiction of the Bishops 
and insisted that, as a Methodist preacher, charges 

152 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 153 

of heresy could only be entertained by the annual 
conference of which I was a member; but thus far 
I had won by the passive attitude, and I consid- 
ered that the more Christian. I found later that 
it was also the wiser, since my conference was so 
conservative that in a trial before it I could hardly 
hope for acquittal, and I could not get two Bish- 
ops with authority in the case to agree to a trans- 
fer to the New England, because, as one of them 
naively put it, I could not be convicted of anything 
in this latter conference. 

The charges were sent to the Board of Bishops 
in October. My answer to them was presented in 
November. We expected that action on them 
would be taken at once, but the Bishops, finding 
that they needed more time, postponed considera- 
tion of the matter until their spring meeting. 

Meanwhile becoming tired of seeing Sayce and 
Hommel quoted as defenders of the faith, I pub- 
Hshed in the Central Christian Advocate an article 
in two parts, entitled Sayce the Conservative, in 
which I showed that, although he could not be 
classed with the critics, with whom he delighted to 
differ, he was clearly not a conservative; that, in 
fact, he said, ''The same evidence which obliges us 
to reject the conclusions of the newer criticism in 
one place obliges us to reject those of the older 
school in another." 



154 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

In this connection I ought also to mention, as 
proof of my continued interest in Missions, that 
in March, at the invitation of the Faculty of Wes- 
leyan University, I addressed the students on the 
subject of The New Philanthropy. 

Both parties to my case, while waiting for the 
Bishops, were more or less active. My opponents 
used the press freely. I have already quoted one 
of their pamphlets. I have another on The De- 
structive Biblical Criticism by the same author, 
W. W. Shenk. The former was addressed to the 
Bishops among others, and the latter was doubt- 
less of the material at their disposal. I can think 
of only one document which my friends contrib- 
uted. It was a compilation of the testimony of 
members of the class of 1899, the one in which the 
trouble originated, on the following four points: 

1. The Christian character and influence of its 

teacher. 

2. His fairness in the classroom. 

3. The soundness of his theological doctrines. 

4. The character of the opposition of his teach- 

ing displayed in the class. 
There were thirty-three in the class exclusive of 
the five who signed the charges. Of this number 
the compiler was able to reach only thirty, but they 
were all more ardent in my support than I was con- 
ceited enough to expect, and more severe in their 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 155 

condemnation of the disturbers of our work than 
I had ever thought of being. 

The Bishops came to a decision May 29, that 
is, just before the close of the General Conference 
of 1900, but not before asking me to state my 
views on the more fundamental doctrines of our 
Church. What they asked and how I answered, 
will appear from their report, dated June 8, of 
which the following is a copy : 

Concerning the confirmation of the re-election 
of the Rev. H. G. Mitchell, D. D., as a Professor 
in the School of Theology of the Boston University, 
we make the following record: 

We have received and carefully considered 
numerous documents, written and printed, — sev- 
eral of them very full and elaborate and containing 
the separate or combined declarations o^ many 
individuals, — stating antithetic opinions as to the 
teachings of Professor Mitchell. We have noted 
with care Professor Mitchell's replies to his critics, 
communicated to President Warren and trans- 
mitted by him to us. 

We are constrained to believe that Professor 
Mitchell's teachings have been in some particulars 
unguarded and misleading, and especially that 
some of his statements, in the line of the so-called 
Higher Criticism of the Old Testament, have not 
been sufficiently conservative ; and still further that 
the manner of his teaching has sometimes led to 
injurious misunderstanding of his real beliefs. We 
deeply deplore such errors of opinion and infelici- 



156 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

ties of method, which have in part been the oc- 
casion for such criticism of his work. 

We note, however, with satisfaction, the very 
general testimony to his deep personal consecra- 
tion and earnest Christian spirit, and his personal 
declarations of full faith in the fundamental doc- 
trines of Christianity as held by the Methodist 
Episcopal Church. 

In answer to a letter of inquiry from one of the 
Bishops, Professor Mitchell wrote, on May 14, 
1900, as follows: 

'When the Bishop's address appeared, I wrote to 
President Warren expressing my admiration for 
the document as a whole, and the paragraph on 
Doctrinal Fidelity in particular. The more I 
study this confession the better I like it. I accept 
in their natural and necessary interpretation all its 
statements. I have never intentionally taught any- 
thing which, when properly understood, conflicts 
with any of them.' 

The paragraph referred to is this : 

'Doctrinal Fidelity.— Inasmuch as the per- 
manence and growth of the Christian Church, or 
any part of it, are inseparable from fidelity to the 
truth as it is in Jesus, we rejoice to report our be- 
lief that the theological convictions and teachings 
of our Church are, in the main, unchanged; that 
through its entire extent, at home and abroad, the 
essential Christian verities, as received from our 
fathers and by which we have hitherto ministered 
successfully to the kingdom of God, are firmly held 
and positively proclaimed. We believe in one liv- 
ing and personal God, the Father Almighty, who 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 157 

in perfect wisdom, holiness and love pervades, 
sustains and rules the worlds which he has made. 
We believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son our Lord, 
in whom dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead 
bodily, who was in glory with the Father before 
all worlds, who became flesh and dwelt among us 
the brightness of the Glory of God and the ex- 
press image of his person, who died for sins, the 
just for the unjust, that he might bring man to 
God, who rose from the dead, who ascended on 
high, having received all power in heaven and on 
earth for the completion, by grace and judgment, 
of the kingdom of God. We believe in the Holy 
Ghost, very and eternal God, the Lord and Giver 
of Life, by whose operation of men dead in tres- 
press image of his person, who died for sins, the 
faith and loving obedience, are made aware of 
their sonship with God and are empowered to rise 
into the full stature of men in Christ Jesus. We 
beheve in the impartial love of God to the whole 
human family, so that none are excluded from the 
benefits thereof, except as they exclude them- 
3elves by wilful unbelief and sin. We believe that 
faith in Christ, the self-surrender of the soul to 
his government and grace, is the one condition 
upon w^hich man is reconciled to God, is bom 
again, becomes partaker of the divine nature and 
attains sanctification through the Spirit. We ac- 
cept the moral law confirmed and perfected by 
the divine Teacher and set forth authoritatively in 
the Holy Scriptures; and we believe in eternal 
consequences of good and evil, inherent in the con- 
stitution of the human soul and declared with ut- 
most solemnity by him, the final Judge of human 



158 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

life. These central truths of the Christian system 
we think were never more positively held and de- 
clared amono' us than they now are. They were 
so clearly apprehendeil and stated by our founders 
that the progress of theological study has not 
forced us to hold them either by excision from, or 
by additions to. our former creed. They are part 
of our inalienable inheritance. By this sign we 
conquer.' 

Desiring to be more particularly assured of Pro- 
fessor ^MitchelFs belief of certain doctrines, concern- 
inof which his teachino- has been most criticized, tlie 
Board of Bishops sent him the following let- 
ter: 

Chicago, III., May 23, 1900 
Prof. H. G. :Mitchell, 
Reverend and Dear Brother: — 

The Bishops have received with genuine pleas- 
ure yom- letter of assent to the Doctrinal state- 
ment in our address to the General Conference, 
which we have been glad to know has been re- 
ceived with wide approval, but we find it necessary 
on accomit of specific allegations made to us to 
ask you for more definite answers or statements 
of belief as to the following points: 

1st. Do you accept the Divine Authority of the 
Old Testament, recognizing therein a supernatural 
element including prophecy and miracles f 

2nd. Do you accept the supernatural birth of 
Jesus Christ as expressed in the Apostles' Creed, 
Conceived by the Holy Ghost and born of the 
Virgin ]Mary? 



A ClfANGK OF VENUE 1S9 

**U\, J Jo you accept the (Uxdnnt of the Trinity, 
as (torrirnoniy understood by Meth<xJist and other 
Kvangehcal Churches, including the JJeity of Jesus 
Christ and the personality and JJeitv of the Holy 
C;host? 

4th. J Jo you beJiev'e that the death of Jesus 
Christ vsras necessarv' to the redemption and sal- 
vation of men? 

oth. I Jo you believe in the eternal conseriuences 
of sin as expressed in the Xew Testament and in 
our Hituiil? 

We must ask the earliest possible reply, as the 
further consideration of your confirmation awaits 
your answer to these questions. 

AsHurin^ yon of our fraternal regard and high 
personal esteem, we are, 

Your Brothers in Christ, the Bishops 

of the M. P^. Church 
By E. G. Andrews, Sec'y. 
Write your answer.' 

To these inquiries he made the following reply: 

'Boston-, Mass., May 20, 1900 
Bishop Andrews, 

SecTctary Board of Bishops, 

Methodist General Conference, Chicago. 

I accept the Old Testament as divinely authori- 
tative, recrjgrjizing a supernatural element mani- 
fested in miracles and prophecy. 

I accept the Gospel statement respecting JesiLs' 
a/1 vent into the world. 

I believe in the Trinity, including the Deity of 
Christ and the Holy Spirit. 



160 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

I believe that the death of Jesus was necessary 
for the salvation of mankind. 

I have not, and never had, any sympathy with the 
doctrines of Universalism. 

H. G. Mitchell/ 

Professor Mitchell has also signed the Declar- 
ation, required of all Theological Professors whose 
names are before the Bishops for confirmation 
of their election, of his sincere acceptance of the 
Doctrines and Discipline of our Church, and of his 
purpose to teach in harmony therewith. 

We cannot be insensible to the judgment con- 
cerning Professor Mitchell of those who ought to 
know his work thoroughly, indicated by his unan- 
imous re-election by the Board of Trustees and the 
unaminous approval of that election by the Faculty 
of the School of Theology. 

In consideration of all the facts of this em- 
barrassing case, we hereby signify, not without 
hesitation, our confirmation of the re-election of 
Professor H. G. Mitchell as a Professor in the 
School of Theology of the Boston University; and 
express the earnest hope that the criticism to which 
he has been subjected may lead him to a careful re- 
consideration of some of his doctrinal statements 
and of some of his methods of instruction, and thus 
to greater usefulness in the work to which his life 
has been devoted. 

By order and in behalf of the Board of Bishops, 

Edw'd G. Andrews, 
Chicago, III., May 29, 1900. Secretary. 

This report needs explanation. At first sight 
it seems to mean that I had recanted my alleged 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 161 

heresies and allowed myself to be so bound that I 
could no longer teach my honest views without 
laying myself liable to a charge of perjury; and it 
has been so understood. This, however, can easily 
be shown to be a mistaken interpretation. That I 
had recanted nothing appears from the quotation 
from my letter to President Warren concerning 
the Bishops' Address; for, after saying that I ac- 
cepted "in their natural and necessary interpreta- 
tion" all the statements in the confession of faith, 
I took pains to add, that I had "never intention- 
ally taught anything which, when properly inter- 
preted, conflicted with any of them." If this state- 
ment had been questioned, I should have referred 
the objector to the paper in which I had met the 
charges preferred against me. Note, also, my ra- 
phes to the questions of the Bishops on the par- 
ticular points on which they desired additional in- 
formation. Thereby hangs a tale. I was re- 
quested to make "the earliest possible reply." I 
therefore went to work at once and, following my 
usual practice, put my views of the several points 
with perfect frankness and in the simplest every- 
day language. I was rather pleased with the re- 
sult; but, before telegraphing it to the Bishops, it 
occurred to me to consult my friend Professor 
Bowne in the matter. Having read my state- 
ments, he said that they were well put and he thor- 



162 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

oughly approved of them, "but," he added, "if you 
send them to the Bishops, they won't confirm you, 
because they won't understand you. You'll have 
to put them into a more theological form; then 
they'll prdbably be satisfactory." I took his ad- 
vice and recast them, without in the least intention- 
ally modifying my meaning. If now these state- 
ments be examined, it will be found that they are 
so worded that they harmonize with my previously 
expressed ideas on the same subjects. The first, 
for example, neither declares nor implies that the 
entire Old Testament is divinely authoritative. 
In the second I took care to say that I accepted the 
teachings of the Gospel, not the Apostles' Creed 
or any particular version, but the concordant testi- 
mony of evangelical tradition, which, of course, 
remained to be determined. The third did not 
commit me to any particular form of the doctrine 
of the trinity; probably the Bishops themselves 
could not have agreed on the subject. The fom^th 
question was so indefinite that I might have an- 
swered in either the affirmative or the negative or 
in both ways. In my fifth statement I confined 
myself to the denial of the doctrine of retribution 
which the Bishops presumably had in mind. These 
statements, having been accepted by the Bishops, 
must be taken as an allowable interpretation of my 
general acceptance of their confession of faith. 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 163 

It is clear from the care with which I framed my 
answers to the Bishops that, although I might 
change my methods, I did not intend to suppress 
the results of my studies in the Hebrew Scriptures. 
Indeed, I had, while the Bishops were considering 
my case, pubhshed an article from which it ought 
to have been evident that I would not thus betray 
those who looked to me for instruction. This arti- 
cle was written at the request of the Editor of the 
Daily Advocate, the organ of the General Con- 
ference, and pulblished in his paper, — to the sur- 
prise and indignation of some of the delegates. I 
give the article entire, as showing not merely that 
I had not changed my course, but that I was will- 
ing to take the consequences of loyalty to my con- 
victions. 

The Church and its Theological Teachers. 

The functions of a theological teacher are deter- 
mined by his attitude, or that of the denomination 
to which he belongs, toward truth. 

Some years ago an American Bishop, in a con- 
troversial pamphlet, said, 'The Church is not a 
seeker after truth.' The author of this statement 
was an Episcopahan. If, now, this were really 
the acknowledged doctrine of the Episcopal 
Church, the office and duty of its theological 
teachers would simply be to guard and defend the 
treasure committed to their keeping. 

They would, first of all, accept, without question 



164 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

or reservation, in their entirety, the thirty-nine ar- 
ticles of the Creed and any other formulas regarded 
as standards of orthodoxy. 

Having adopted this body of doctrine, it would 
become their duty to repress, as a temptation of the 
father of lies, the least doubt with reference to 
the correctness of any of its contents, and compel 
themselves to think as their authorities dictated. 

In case of an attack upon their cherished tenets, 
they would take the groundlessness, if not the mali- 
ciousness, of the objections offered for granted, and 
defend the faith, the milder by appeals to the Fath- 
ers, the sterner by reproaches and anathemas. 

Of course, men who really believed that the com- 
munion to which they belonged already possessed 
the truth would not, like Pastor John Robinson, 
be on the lookout for "more truth and light" from 
God's Holy Word, or from any other source, but 
would spend all the strength and ingenuity they 
possessed in showing that anything they were forced 
by biblical research or scientific investigation to 
accept was explicitly or implicitly contained in 
their symbols. 

It is not probable that there are many Episco- 
palians who would agree with the venerable Bishop 
above quoted. There certainly, in spite of the fact 
that our Discipline forbids us to change our stan- 
dards, cannot be many modern Methodists, who 
would claim that these standards are infalhble. 
Thus Dr. Mudge, writing on the subject, 'Why 
I am a Methodist', says : — 

'I am not a Methodist because I believe that 
Methodism, and it alone, has aU the truth, and noth- 
ing but the truth. No human organization can 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 165 

rightly make any such a claim. Something of error 
will necessarily attach to its creed, something of im- 
perfection to its economy. Neither the Methodist 
Church nor any other, whatever Pope Leo may say, 
is altogether or absolutely perfect. Changes of 
considerable moment have already been effected, 
both in its doctrine and discipline ; and it is entirely 
certain that there will be other improvements as the 
years go on.' 

It is plain that, from the standpoint of Dr. 
Mudge — ^who may safely be taken as a represen- 
tative Methodist — the functions of the theological 
teacher must be regarded as very different from 
those just described. 

In the first place, one who occupies this stand- 
point will accept the doctrines of his Church, not 
because he finds them absolutely perfect, but be- 
cause, after devout and thorough study, they seem 
to him to set forth, more satisfactorily than the 
creed of any other communion with which he is 
acquainted, the truth with reference to God and 
man and their mutual relations. 

Having thus committed himself, if, in process 
of time, doubt on any point arises, he will not 
smother it, but asking the aid of the Divine Spirit, 
whose office it is to lead us into all truth, con- 
tinue his researches and loyally accept the results 
thus obtained. 

The scholar who does not take for granted the 
infallibility of the system of doctrine that he has 
adopted will have his own way of meeting criticism 
of it. He will regard such criticism, unless it is 
evidently dictated by passion or prejudice, as a 
smnmons to re-examine the point, or points, against 



166 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

which it is directed, and see if perchance, after all, 
they may not be vulnerable; and if he finds them 
weak or mistaken, he will, in the interest, not only 
of truth, but of his own denomination, at once seek 
to remedy the defect. 

Finally, the scholar who is not tied hand and 
foot by a false and absurd ecclesiology, like the 
prophet of old, will be constantly on his watch- 
tower. He will search the Scriptures for larger 
meanings in the ancient oracles of God ; he will ran- 
sack history for hints concerning the purposes of 
the Almighty; he will study the influence of the 
Holy Spirit on his own mind and heart, to find in 
it confirmation or correction for current theories; 
and all this for the glory of God and the honor of 
the branch of the Church Universal in which it is 
his privilege to labor. 

All this is implied when it is admitted that the 
Church is a seeker after truth. There are those 
who, although they feel obliged to accept this prin- 
ciple, will shrink from the application of it in an 
actual policy. They are not sure that it is safe 
to allow so great liberty. Of course, there is a 
possibihty that it may be abused. There are, how- 
ever, safeguards against such a result. In the first 
place, the Christian scholar will seek the guidance 
of God's spirit, and, having it, he can hardly go 
far astray. Again, the searching criticism to which 
he knows that his every utterance of importance 
will be subjected by the organs of secular as well 
as ecclesiastical opinion will make him careful in 
the formation of his conclusions. Lastly, recog- 
nizing, as he must, that the liberty he enjoys is of 
the nature of a trust, the feeling of responsibility 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 167 

thus engendered will restrain his enthusiasm and 
refine his temper, as the one would not be re- 
strained, or the other refined, by external sanctions. 
In this, as in other relations in Kfe, the surest 
way to make a man trustworthy is to trust him. 

I wonder if this plea for confidence had any 
effect on the Bishops. At any rate they confirmed 
me, and that not only in spite of the efforts of my 
original accusers, but of at least one other who 
came to their assistance. This was the Rev. T. 
McK. Stuart, of the Des Moines Conference, in a 
couple of papers, one of which was sent to the Trus- 
tees and both to the Bishops. President Warren 
called my attention to them. I therefore addressed 
my reply to him, but, knowing that it would be 
forwarded to the complainant, I took a different 
tone from that which I used in other cases. I 
quote what I said on two points which had not 
previously been emphasized as he emphasized them : 

"In the first place. Dr. Stuart makes frequent 
reference to 'the uniform consensus of Methodist 
teaching'. . . . He characterizes my teaching con- 
cerning the genuineness ... of certain parts of 
the Hebrew Scriptures as 'contrary to the doctrines 
of the Methodist Church,' and throughout he takes 
for granted that there is a standard on the subject 
of the origin and interpretation of the Old Testa- 
ment from which I have departed. I deny this 
fundamental imphcation, and I am sure that any 



168 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

one who will give the matter a little thought will 
sustain me in this position. Take, first, the ques- 
tion of the date and authorship of the several books 
or any part of them. Suppose we want an ortho- 
dox opinion on the origin of the twenty-third psalm. 
In the title it is expressly attributed to David, 
and, at first sight, this seems the most reasonable 
view with reference to its authorship. Moreover, 
Professor Harman, in the authorized Introduction 
to the Scriptures written by him, says there is 'no 
sufficient reason for denying that it was composed 
by the royal poet.' What, however, says the great- 
est of Methodist commentators, Adam Clarke, 
whose works are pubUshed by the Book Concern 
and recommended without qualification by our resi- 
dent Bishop ? This : 'There is nothing particular 
in the title; it is simply attributed to David, but, as 
it appears to be a thanksgiving of the Israelites for 
their redemption from the Babylonian Captivity, 
it cannot with propriety be attributed to David. I 
rather incline to the opinion that it was written 
after the Captivity f And this is not the only in- 
stance in which Dr. Clarke rejects the testimony 
of the titles of the Book of Psahns. He does so 
in no fewer than thirty cases, and in at least four- 
teen of them Professor Harman takes the opposite 
view. Which should one follow to avoid suspicion 
of heresy on the part of such as Dr. Stuart? 

"Perhaps, however, our authorities will be more 
harmonious in the matter of interpretation. Let 
us see. I turn to Clarke's Commentary, where I 
find that this great scholar interprets the first chap- 
ter of Genesis as a description of the creation, in six 
literal days, of the visible universe; but, when I 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 169 

consult Whedon's commentary on the same pas- 
sage, I discover that Newhall utterly rejects this 
view, declaring that 'the language of the writer and 
the very conditions of the case are against the 
assumption of a universal cosmogony.' These two 
authorities, both endorsed by the Church, are like- 
wise at odds on the proper understanding of the 
third chapter; for Newhall refuses to follow his 
predecessor, who held that the animal employed 
as a mask in the temptation of Eve by Satan 
was not a serpent at all, but a monkey. Here, 
again, the assumption on which Dr. Stuart bases 
his criticism of my teaching finds evident refuta- 
tion. 

"I think that I have shown that there is no con- 
sensus of Methodist teaching on the origin or inter- 
pretation of the Old Testament. Let me go far- 
ther and assert that there is no law or precedent giv- 
ing any Methodist a right to dictate to another what 
he shall, or shall not, think or teach on these sub- 
jects. This is no new doctrine. It seems to me to 
be implied in our article on the Scriptures, and it 
is distinctly taught by the great commentator al- 
ready cited. At the close of his discussion of the 
nature of the tempter he says: 'If, however, any 
person should choose to differ from the opinion 
stated above, he is at perfect liberty to do so. I 
make it no article of faith, nor of Christian com- 
munion. I crave the same liberty to judge for 
myself that I give to others, to which every man has 
an indisputable right, and I hope no man will call 
me a heretic. — (Would not Dr. Stuart have done 
so if he had been given the opportunity?) — for de- 
parting in this respect from the common opinion, 



170 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

which appears to me to be so embarrassed as to be 
altogether unintelhgible.' 

"Let me quote another passage from the great 
work of this brave as well as gifted scholar. It 
is from his introduction to the Song of Solomon, the 
current and orthodox interpretation of which he 
repudiates. He says: 'The conviction of my 
mind, and the conclusion to which I have conscien- 
tiously arrived, are the result of frequent examina- 
tion, careful study, and close thinking at intervals 
for nearly fifty years, and, however, I may be 
blamed by some, and pitied by others, I must say, 
and I say it fearlessly as I do conscientiously, that 
in this inimitable fine elegant Hebrew poem I see 
nothing of Christ and His Church, and nothing 
that appears to have been intended to be thus un- 
derstood; and nothing, if applied in this way, that, 
p'er se, can promote the interests of vital godliness, 
or cause the simple and sincere not to know Christ 
after the flesh. Here I conscientiously stand. 
May God help me!' If this means anything it 
means that the great expositor, not only did not 
wish to impose his interpretation of any Scripture 
upon others, but also that he would not allow any 
one else to impose upon him an interpretation that 
could not be made to appear to him to be based on 
the evidence in the case. I take the same position, 
insisting that, if Dr. Stuart wishes me to change 
my views, he shall cease to appeal to a consensus 
of Methodist teaching that has no existence, except 
in his imagination, and would not be authoritative, 
if it existed, and shall produce reasons for the aban- 
donment of these views which will outweigh the 
results of twenty years of the closest and devout- 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 171 

est study, to say nothing of the opinions of other 
bibhcal scholars. Until he has done this I can only 
follow the example of Dr. Clarke, as he followed 
that of Luther, and say, 'Here I conscientiously 
stand. May God help me!' 

"I think I have shown that Dr. Stuart is un- 
Methodistic as well as unscholarly; but what shaU 
I say of the declaration with which he prefaces 
his protest against my teaching? He says that 
there can be 'no valid objection' to setting before 
the pupils of our institutions 'the teachings of the 
most ultra school of criticism,' but he objects to the 
teaching of a destructive criticism with the author- 
ity and sanction of the teacher. See, also, on page 
five of his paper his complaint that the doctrines I 
teach are not merely my 'tentative, speculative 
opinions, but are taught' 'with strong personal en- 
dorsement to the students of the Boston School of 
Theology.' These words reveal a conception of 
the office and duty of the theological teacher that 
ought to make any one who reads them thankful 
that the author of them is not himself in a position 
to practice what he preaches. Consider what it 
implies. In the first place, it virtually forbids the 
teacher to take any personal interest in the doc- 
trines he teaches, accepting and imparting them be- 
cause they commend themselves to him as a searcher 
for truth; in fact it forbids any such thing as the 
search for truth. On the other hand, this concep- 
tion permits the so-called teacher to present to his 
pupils, not only the palpably absurd vagaries of 
past ages, but the most attractive and dangerous 
errors, so long as he refrains from openly endors- 
ing them. Xow, I have no hesitation in saying that 



172 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

I consider any such doctrine, not simply erroneous, 
but absolutely Jesuitical. I have accepted the 
views I hold because, after as sincere and thorough 
investigation as I was able to give to the various 
subjects to which they relate, I was convinced that 
they were correct. They are a source of mental 
and spiritual profit and satisfaction to me, and, be- 
cause this is the case, I not only retain them, but 
commend them to my pupils. I have never put 
into print, or taught in my classes, anything that 
I did not, when I wrote or said it, believe with all 
my heart. The result is that I have preserved my 
self-respect and my enthusiasm for my calling, 
and, if you will permit me to say what others have 
repeatedly said, achieved a success of which I am 
justly proud. If I had followed Dr. Stuart's 
theory and retained the position I occupy in spite 
of my uselessness to the School, I should expect 
in the end to have my portion 'with the hypo- 
crites.' " 

Such was Dr. Stuart's Protest. I do not wonder 
that the Bishops ignored it. It seems almost a 
reflection on their intelligence to have imagined 
that they might be influenced by it. I am sorry 
to be obUged to use such language; but it is no 
stronger than that used by Professor Sheldon and 
endorsed by the Standing Committee, in closing his 
reply to the same party. He says: "A review of 
the complainant's specifications compels me to con- 
clude that he has entered precipitately upon the 
task of guarding and avenging the faith. ... I 



A CHANGE OF VENUE 173 

must, however, express the opinion, that, before 
entering upon the specific project undertaken by 
him, he should have enlarged his equipment, and 
moreover taken time to reflect, not only on the dis- 
ciphnary requirement to contend against false doc- 
trine, but also on the apostolic sentiment, that the 
weapons of our warfare are not carnal. Ques- 
tions of criticism that are taxing to the most 
competent, reverent, and judicial scholarship of 
the w^orld are not matters for such an off-hand set- 
tlement as the complainant seems to think feasible." 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 

When, on entering upon the fifth term of my 
professorship, I took stock of the situation, I found 
much that was encouraging. In the first place, the 
Faculty, some of whom had at first been disposed 
to question, at least the wisdom of my methods, 
had come to a clearer understanding of the origin 
of the trouble from which we had emerged and 
earnestly lalbored to secure my confirmation. Pro- 
fessor Sheldon, acting as their spokesman, on 
several occasions met attacks upon me or the 
School with ready and conclusive reasoning. The 
Trustees were practically unanimous in their will- 
ingness to allow me the liberty I had always en- 
joyed. I therefore looked forward to at least i^ve 
years of the best work of which I was capable and 
corresponding results. I was grateful to the 
Bishops for their official recognition of me as an 
authorized teacher in our Church, and I meant to 
show my appreciation of it, but I did not take very 
seriously the warning that some saw in the sugges- 
tion that I carefully reconsider some of my doc- 
trinal statements as well as some of my methods 
of instruction. Of course, I intended continually 

174 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 175 

to revise and improve both the matter that I was 
giving to the students and the manner of its pre- 
sentation; but as a scholar I could not agree be- 
forehand to make such changes in my views as 
would render them "sufficiently conservative" to 
suit anyone, even my ecclesiastical superiors. All 
that I could promise was, that I would go as 
deeply as I could into the subjects I was teaching, 
learn all I could about them, and, if possible, pre- 
sent the truth thus discovered in the way in which 
it ought to be a blessing to those who accepted it. 
I took this course. I did not expect that I should 
seriously suffer in so doing. I knew that the 
School was steadily growing in spite of the late dis- 
turbance, and that the danger of the recurrence of 
anything of the kind was constantly decreasing. 
I knew, too, that a majority of the Bishops were in- 
clined to be tolerant, if not liberal, and I hoped 
that henceforth the number of those of that type 
in the Board would be increased rather than dimin- 
ished. In any case I could only stand by my 
convictions and face the consequences. 

I had occasion to apply the principle I had 
adopted in 1901. I had for several years been giv- 
ing two courses of lectures to the Middle Class; 
one on the origin and structure of the Pentateuch, 
the other on the first eleven chapters of Genesis. 
To relieve the students of the drudgery of taking 



176 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

notes, and at the same time to cover more ground 
than we otherwise could, I had put a text of these 
lectures into printed or typewritten form. I 
found, however, that even so I could furnish only 
an outline of the subjects discussed, and that at 
an expense greater than it ought to cost. I there- 
fore finally decided to put the complete lectures 
into a book. When I had done so, under the title 
The World Before Abraham, I consulted two 
of the wisest men connected with the University, 
both of whom, after examining the manuscript, said 
there was nothing in it that ought to offend any 
reasonable reader. One of them added that, if ag- 
itation again arose, the book would be helpful in 
refuting the misunderstandings and misrepresen- 
tations from which I had too often suffered. I in- 
tended that it should, and, to that end, I had taken 
pains as occasion offered, to indicate the precise 
bearing of points made and the advantage of rec- 
ognizing them. Thus at the end of the first partj 
on the Pentateuch, I summed up my discussion 
of it as follows: 

"The outcome, then, of the investigation under- 
taken IS, that, although in parts of the Bible the 
Pentateuch is attributed to Moses, and such, for 
centuries, was the teaching of the Christian as well 
as the Jewish Church, the doctrine is based on a 
mistaken tradition, the truth being that this so- 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS ITT 

called 'Law of Moses' is a composite work, the 
growth of the entire period from Moses to Ezra. 
This conclusion, being based on the best of evidence, 
will have to be accepted, however it may affect the 
authority of the Pentateuch or the renown of its 
supposed author. As a matter of fact it ought not 
to diminish either. In the church of S. Pietro in 
Vincoli, at Rome, is the famous statue of the He- 
brew lawgiver. It is a magnificent work of art, 
and, at first, one is glad that it is placed where its 
minutest details can conveniently be examined. 
Soon, however, the spectator with some artistic 
judgment begins to be disturbed in his enjoyment. 
There seems to be something wrong with the mas- 
terpiece. Its gi^andeur is so obtrusive that it be- 
comes oppressive. He turns to his guidebook and 
there finds an explanation for the effect produced 
upon him. The statue, it appears, was not meant 
for the place which it now occupies, but was to 
have formed part of a colossal monument in the 
largest of the world's cathedrals. Suppose, now, 
that some great artist should carry out the original 
plan of Michael Angelo, complete the monument 
to Julius II., and add it to the attractions of S. 
Pietro in Vaticano. Would anyone with any taste 
probably object to such a consummation? One 
might at first miss the sharpness of outline which 
now forces itself upon the beholder, and feel a little 
confused by the thirty other statues belonging to 
the design of the mausoleum ; but the genius of the 
greatest of modem sculptors is a guarantee that, 
in the end, both the artist and his work would re- 
ceive increased admiration. What might be done 
for the Moses of art the biblical scholars of the last 



178 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

half century have done for the Moses of history. 
They have deprived him, indeed, of the lesser honor 
of having written a great work at the dictation of 
the Deity, but, in associating with him the succes- 
sion of writers by whom the Pentateuch was ac- 
tually composed, they have given him the preem- 
inence, as the inspired founder of a nation and its 
religion, for which his God designed him. More- 
over, those whose eyes are open to 'behold won- 
drous things' out of the Scriptures say of the proc- 
ess now revealed, as devoutly as they ever did of 
the one by which they formerly believed the Penta- 
teuch to have been produced, 

'This is from Yahweh, 

And it is marvellous in our eyes.' " 

In the Commentary, after stating the discrep- 
ancies between the first account of Creation and 
the modern theory of the origin of the system to 
which the earth belongs, I said : 

"These are serious divergencies, but their signifi- 
cance may be exagg^erated. They make it im- 
possible for the intelligent student to accept the 
biblical account as a correct record of the process of 
creation ; but they do not make it necessary for him 
to reject it as valueless from the religious, or even 
from the scientific, standpoint. In the first place, 
although the doctrine of God here taught can hardly 
be regarded as perfectly satisfactory to the Chris- 
tian believer, it was sufficiently developed along 
right lines to furnish a basis for religion and mor- 
ality unequaled in the period to which it belongs. 
The author's conception of creation, too, displays 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 179 

a philosophic insight that is remarkable. Indeed, 
in its essential features, the unity of nature and the 
gradual origin of things, it harmonizes so perfectly 
with the modern theory, that the latter should be 
regarded as supplemental rather than abrogative 
of it. See Ryle, eng, 23ff. Finally, the fact 
that the Sabbath did not originate exactly as de- 
scribed does not warrant a denial of its sanctity ; for, 
as in the case of Sunday, the antiquity of the He- 
brew rest-day, and the beneficent results of its ob- 
servance are sufficient to assure one who has a sense 
for the divine that it was a providential institu- 
tion." 

To make good my contention I must quote the 
conclusion of my discussion of the Flood. It reads 
as follows: 

"The above discussion has made clear, (1) that 
the Hebrew story of the Flood is composite, and 
(2) that the two accounts interwoven to produce it 
present important variations. Incidentally it has 
been shown, also, that the Babylonian story is a 
third account of the same event, differing in some 
respects from both, but most from the latter, of the 
others. This last, being the oldest of the three, 
and therefore nearest to the event which they all 
describe, must be taken into account in any attempt 
to determine the real nature of that event and the 
date of its occurrence. Now, although this story, 
also, represents the Flood as having destroyed all 
mankind except the occupants of Utnapishtim's 
vessel, there are indications that the original catas- 
trophe was the destruction of a city called Shurip- 



180 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

pak on the lower Euphrates. It is therefore prob- 
able that a local inundation was the common foun- 
dation of the three accounts. It must have oc- 
curred long before 2348 B. C, the date of the 
Flood according to the Priestly narrator, as ap- 
pears from the fact that the hero of the event is 
one, the last, of the ten kings of the prehistoric 
period. This means that neither of the accounts 
can be regarded as strictly historical. It does not, 
however, mean that they are all alike valueless. 
When they are compared as vehicles of moral and 
religious instruction, the superiority of the Hebrew 
accounts is at once apparent. The Babylonian 
story is polytheistic, and its gods are as capricious, 
jealous and quarrelsome as those of the other 
ancient pantheons. Its hero is the favorite of one 
of these divinities. The Hebrew tradition, on the 
other hand, even in its oldest known form, is thor- 
oughly monotheistic, and its God is a being whose 
character commands instant and unmixed rever- 
ence. Its hero is the man who alone won the favor 
of his God by his righteousness. The latter story 
would naturally have an effect upon those among 
whom it circulated as salutary as that of the other 
must have been unwholesome, and there can be no 
doubt that, in spite of its unhistorical features, it 
has been the means, under God, of deterring many 
from sin and confirming them in reverence for, and 
obedience to, their Maker." 

I will leave The World before Abraham for 
the present, but I shall have more than one occasion 
to refer to it as we proceed, and especially to the 
passages quoted, because they will furnish a fair 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 181 

basis for judgment concerning the further criticism 
to which I was subjected. 

The book was given to the printer in the spring 
of 1901. I expected to use it when the School 
opened in the fall; but long before that date my 
plans had been radically changed and I was again 
on my way to Palestine. This time I went as 
Director of the American School of Oriental Re- 
search in Jerusalem, an institution affiliated with 
the Society of Biblical Literatiu^e and Exegesis, 
which had been established in the preceding year. 
The first Director was Professor Torrey of Yale. 
When the time came to appoint the second, Pro- 
fessor Thayer of Harvard, who had the matter in 
charge, asked me to go, and, when I hesitated, 
urged me so earnestly that I finally yielded, al- 
though I was convinced that I was risking my 
health by so doing. I read the last proofs of The 
World before Abraham in my stateroom on the 
evening of June 11 and the next morning we set 
sail for England. 

I had been given to understand that I might 
be called upon to do something in the way of exca- 
vating. That I might be the better prepared for 
such work, we went directly to London, where I 
spent several weeks, chiefly in the study of 
Phoenician inscriptions at the British Museum. I 



182 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

also collected some books for the library of the 
School, for which purpose I later went to Paris and 
Leipzig. 

We intended to reach Jerusalem by the first of 
October, but we were caught in quarantine at 
Corfu, and, as a result, thenceforth missed our con- 
nections; so that we did not reach our destination 
until the fifteenth of the month, and then not in 
the best of condition. 

I was not long in discovering that the hope of 
being able to excavate was, for various good and 
sufficient reasons, without foundation. I therefore 
lost no time in setting myself and the single stu- 
dent, Mr. Meyer of Cincinnati, who had reported, 
to work at something else. The wall of the city, be- 
ing constantly before us wherever we turned, 
naturally very soon and very deeply impressed 
us. We therefore made it the first subject of in- 
vestigation and spent days on days in tracing its 
course in the different periods of its history and 
taking pictures and descriptions of its present 
direction and condition. I wrote a paper on "The 
Wall of Nehemiah," with illustrations, which was 
finally published in the Journal of Biblical Lit- 
erature. From the material gathered at that time 
I have since prepared another paper on the present 
wall, including a discussion of the materials used, 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 183 

the sources from which they were obtained, and the 
ways in which the blocks were cut and laid by the 
Hebrew craftsmen. This paper, also, whose pub- 
lication has been delayed by the war, will be abun- 
dantly illustrated. 

When our researches in this direction were com- 
pleted we turned our attention to the rock cut- 
tings at Silwan (Silo am), the little village across 
the Kedron from Jerusalem. There we found 
a variety of excavations in the limestone of the 
Mount of Olives, most of which had originally been 
tombs. Some of them were simple chambers, 
single or in series. The rest, whether single or in 
series, had mortuary provisions consisting of 
benches, cribs, shelves, or loculi, or, in one case, a 
sarcophagus. They had all been emptied of their 
original occupants and transformed, sometimes 
with additions in masonry, into dwellings, stables, 
or storehouses. The only one with architectural 
pretensions was the so-called Tomb of Pharaoh's 
Daughter ; but below, in the valley, are the reputed 
tombs of Absalom, Zechariah, and the apostle 
James. These rock-cuttings, also, I have de- 
scribed in a paper soon to be published by an ar- 
chaeological society. 

While I was engaged in these researches the 
Rev. J. E. Hanauer called on me and, during our 



184 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

conversation, recited a couple of stories current 
among the natives of Palestine. I was greatly 
interested in them, and said so, whereupon he told 
me that he had many such that he had stored in 
his memory during his work in the country. I 
asked him why he did not publish them, assuring 
him that such a collection of folk-lore would be, 
not only interesting, but valuable. He replied 
that he had tried to interest several persons in them, 
but had never found anyone who thought them 
worth publishing. I not only assured him of my 
sincere interest, but offered, if he would give me 
enough to make a volume, to have them published 
in America and give him the proceeds of the ven- 
ture. He seemed pleased with my offer, but ex- 
plained that he, or, rather, his donkey, had injured 
his hand, so that it would be impossible for him, 
at least for the present, to put them into writing. 
At that, determined not to be balked in my project, 
I offered, if he would dictate them to me, to take 
them down and prepare them for the press. To 
this he agreed, and thereafter for several weeks 
he came to my study twice a week and told me 
these stories until I had a collection of sixty-nine, 
many of them interesting, not only as stories, but 
as sources of information concerning the life and 
thought of the country. This is the history of 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 185 

Tales Told in Palestine. I discovered the hoard 
from which its varied contents were taken, and, 
as the agent of the School in Jerusalem, brought 
them to the knowledge of the public; but it was 
Mr. Hanauer who collected and preserved them. 
Therefore, when, after putting the book together, 
I succeeded in selling it to an American house, I 
was happy to send him a substantial draft as a well 
deserved honorarium. I was pleased, also, to learn 
a little later that the English patrons of research in 
Palestine had finally come to a reahzation of his 
availability and taken him into their service. 

We could not, of course, be long in Palestine 
without yielding now and then to the desire to 
travel. Our earlier excursions were comparatively 
brief. The first took us only to Jaffa. We went 
there at the hoHdays to try the air and see if it 
would help us to rid ourselves of a malarial attack. 
We found the climate by the sea considerably 
milder than in the hills, and it, with the oranges 
from the gardens about Jaffa, so curative that, at 
the end of only a week, we returned to Jerusalem 
greatly refreshed and invigorated. 

We had a similarly agreeable experience, when, 
in February, we went for a few days to Jericho for 
an outing. It ought to become a popular winter 
resort, for the climate is delightful and the plain 



186 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

about it could in time be transformed into what 
it once was, a veritable paradise. We visited 
again, of course, the Dead Sea and the Jordan, also 
the wonderful spring at the site of the ancient city ; 
but I was most interested in an excursion to Ain 
Duk, another spring marking the site of the city 
where Simon Maccabeus is supposed to have been 
assassinated, on the route which Joshua must have 
taken, when, having captured Jericho he advanced 
against Ai. 

We did not then follow Joshua farther, but in 
the spring, while we were visiting the Friends at 
Ramallah, we took occasion to see Der Diwan, near 
which Ai must have been situated, and during the 
same visit to study the region of Beth-horon, down 
which the Hebrew leader pursued the routed 
Canaanites. 

I had hoped during the year to take several 
more extended trips; but I was able to make but 
two of them realities. The first took us by way of 
the Plain of Sharon to Galilee. We started from 
Jerusalem on the fourteenth of April, driving from 
the first for the sake of seeing Abu Gosh, some- 
times identified with Kirjath-jearim, and its in- 
teresting old church. We spent the night at 
Ramleh. 

Thence the next morning early we struck north- 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 187 

ward, taking Lyd and its famous church of St. 
George on the way. We did not anticipate any 
difficulty, but we had hardly left the village before 
our driver had lost his bearings and was trying to 
get back to the road he ought to have followed by 
driving through a field of grain against the frantic 
protest of the owner. We finally had to go back 
some distance and take another route. 

In our wanderings we came upon a large ancient, 
but remarkably well preserved temple, standing 
deserted on the Plain, of which I had never heard. 
The next place of interest was Ras el-Ain, with its 
castle and its wonderful spring. It is the site of 
Antipatris, the place to which Paul was brought by 
night, on his way to Caesarea, to get him beyond 
the reach of his Jewish enemies. 

From this point for a few miles our road was 
one with that from Jaffa to Nablus; but the two 
soon diverged, ours running northward, while the 
other bore around to the east. We saw several 
places, the most important being Kalansaweh, with 
a couple of castles, but none of them detained us; 
we had so far to go before we stopped for the night, 
and the road was growing heavier, on account of 
the sand, as we proceeded. Our stopping-place, 
Summarin, when we reached it, proved to be a 
Jewish colony and much more comfortable than we 



188 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

expected. In fact we were quite surprised at the 
evidences of industry and prosperity. 

The next morning, since we were now in no great 
hurry, I took occasion to interview some of the 
people about the place. If I had been a novelist 
I could easily have gotten the materials for an- 
other book from their experience under Turkish 
domination. When we finally left them we saw 
further proof of their agricultural skill as we de- 
scended to Tantura and the sea. From that point 
to Athlit we followed the beach, and thereafter we 
were never far from it; but it was Carmel, with 
its crouching bulk, that most interested us, until 
we rounded its massive head to comfortable lodg- 
ings in the German quarter at Haifa; and even 
then we could not sleep until we had seen the sun 
set from its brow. The next day we went to Naz- 
areth, greatly enjoying the drive. We found the 
narrow pass by which the Kishon leaves the Plain 
of Esdraelon especially interesting for its park- 
like scenery, as well as its historical associations as 
the scene of the overthrow of Sisera. The Plain 
opened out before us as we proceeded, until we 
reached the neighborhood of Nazareth when we 
had an equally fine view of Carmel to the south 
of us. 

The afternoon we spent in revisiting some of the 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 189 

more important points of interest in the village, es- 
pecially the spring, which surely, if it could speak, 
would tell us more than any other object that knew 
him of Jesus and his early life. 

We came to Nazareth, however, not so much 
to revisit its sacred places as to have a convenient 
starting-point for an excursion to Mt. Tabor. The 
next morning, therefore, we were up at half past 
four, and an hour later on our way eastward. At 
eight, although our mounts were no better than 
cart-horses, we were standing on the summit of the 
mountain. It was a sightly place, and the view 
from it in every direction impressive, especially that 
toward the southwest, across the green patchwork 
of Esdraelon, at once the most fertile portion of 
Palestine and the most famous of its battlefields; 
and that toward the northeast, with the Sea of Gali- 
lee just seen through the nearer hills, and that 
mighty presence, Hermon, — the Chief, the Syrians 
call him, — in the background. There was no lack 
of associations with which to beguile the time; we 
therefore gave little heed to the impossible legends 
with which the monk who conducted us would 
gladly have entertained us; but we took a look at 
the more recent excavations and had a lunch at the 
monastery before returning to Nazareth. 

We had intended to go from Nazareth to Ti- 



190 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

berias, but, learning that the hotel at which we 
wished to spend the night was already crowded 
with tourists, we returned to Haifa and made hasty 
arrangements to make the excursion over Carmel 
the next day. 

We started at six in the morning, with a guide, 
on horseback. The weather looked uncertain, but 
on the assurance of our guide, we climbed the 
mountain and pushed eastward, having on our right 
fine views of the Mediterranean, with Athlit and 
Tantura on its glistening shore. When we had 
gone five or six miles a cloud considerably larger 
than a man's hand overtook us and began to drench 
and pelt us with rain and hail. Fortunately one of 
the rare houses on our route was near, and we 
sought shelter in it. It was not a very agreeable 
refuge. The room where we sat consisted of two 
parts. The front, which was level with the ground, 
was occupied by the fowls and a donkey, while we 
were on a raised floor at the back, with our hostess 
and her baJby, a puny little creature, whom, of 
course, we could neither ignore nor handle with any 
relish. Our embarrassment was only increased 
when the woman insisted on making coffee, but 
we drank it, lest she should be offended by a 
refusal. While she was preparing it we visited 
a grove of unusually fine trees in the neigh- 
borhood, where there was a mihrab decorated with 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS l&l 

rags, after the fashion of Mohammedan shrines. 

We did not stop again until we reached the 
Mukrakah, the traditional site of the sacrifice made 
by Elijah when he vanquished and destroyed the 
prophets of Baal. It is probably nearer the place 
to which he sent his servant to watch for signs of! 
rain. The altar, near which the prophet was mean- 
while wrestling in prayer, was probably somewhat 
below the summit, since he could not himself see the 
sea. The view from the summit, when we were 
there, was not as wide as usual, but we could see 
Tabor, and, of course, the whole Plain of Esdraelon 
which lay before us. 

We did not return by the same route by which we 
had come, but, after passing through Esfiya, a large 
Druse village, where the children turned out en 
masse to escort us and have their picture taken, we 
bore northward and made our way by an almost 
impossible path down the side of the mountain to 
Beled esh-Shek, and thence, by the road from 
Nazareth, to Haifa. It had been a long, hard day 
for a green horseman, but, tired as I was, I spent 
an hour in the evening discussing excavations with 
the consul, Dr. Schumacher, who, although an 
American and the local representative of our 
government, was at the time conducting the 
German operations on the side of ancient Megiddo. 

The next day we did not expect to do anything 



192 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

but drive to Akka, on the coast eight miles north of 
Haifa. We did so in the morning, following the 
beach; crossing the Kishon on a pontoon bridge and 
fording the Belus just before reaching our desti- 
nation. The drive so refreshed us that, on the way- 
back, we arranged with our driver to start with us 
that afternoon for Jaffa, and we spent a part of 
that night again at the Jewish colony of Summarin. 
"A part," I say, "of that night," for we wished 
to catch the afternoon train for Jerusalem, and, in 
order to do that, it was necessary for us to deny our- 
selves more than four hours of sleep. Soon after 
midnight, therefore, we were again on the road. 
And we were not the only ones abroad in the moon- 
light at that unseemly hour; for, just as we were 
leaving Summarin, we met some friends, belated 
by the wretchedness of the roads and their horses, 
and a httle later came upon another party whose 
team had refused to go farther. Our own progress 
through the sand of the first miles was slow and 
wearisome, but we finally left it behind. Mean- 
while clouds had been gathering, which, about four 
o'clock treated us to a brisk sprinkling. This made 
the road so wet that, after a brief stop for breakfast, 
our driver, fearing that he would find the usual 
route heavy with mud, took one over a series of 
sand hills. It was tedious in the extreme. One 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 193 

after another we toiled over these rises, a good share 
of the time on foot, always hoping that the one we 
were chmbing would be the last; but we did not 
see the last of them, and the cattle roaming over 
them, until we reached the Aujeh. However, we 
caught the train and reached Jerusalem, — not in 
due time, — grateful for our adventure and a happy- 
issue out of all the toil and danger — one of us 
narrowly escaped serious injury through the care- 
lessness of our guide on Carmel — which it involved. 
If we had a regret it was that Sharon would not 
thenceforth mean to us what it did before we knew 
so much about it. 

The last and most important of these expeditions 
was one that began on the first of May and took 
us to the east of the Jordan. We traveled this time 
under Cook's management, three of us, including 
Mr. Meyer, with three tents, eight attendants, and 
fifteen animals. We left Jerusalem about noon, 
during a sirocco, and camped that night on the 
hither bank of the Jordan. 

The next morning at five we crossed the river 
and made om- way across the plain toward Mt. 
Nebo. We reached Ayun Mousa, the Springs of 
Moses, about noon. From that point we had the 
mountain always before us, and two hours later 
we had the privilege of standing on its summit. 



194 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

The landscape which was spread before us was not 
so wide as the one described in Deuteronomy, but, 
whether the place was that "where Moses stood" or 
not, it was wide enough to make the occasion memo- 
rable. That night we eamped at Madeba, a grow- 
ing Christian colony on the site of the biblical Me- 
deba, where we were permitted a glimpse of the 
wonderful mosaic presenting a map of Palestine 
and Egypt, then recently discovered. 

The next day the air was clear and cool, and 
athrill with the songs of crested larks as we rode 
across the upland between fields of still green wheat 
to the mound that once was Heshbon. Thence our 
route lay through a more broken country to the 
source of the Jabbok and Amman, a Circassian col- 
ony on the site of Rabbah, the capital of the Am- 
monites and the place before which Uriah, the Hit- 
tite — poor fellow! met his death. On the way we 
saw large herds of cattle and finally numerous 
flocks of sheep returning from the water. At one 
point we met a company of Arabs moving, like Ja- 
cob and his family, first the grown people, with 
their donkeys and their household things, then the 
sheep and the goats, and finally the children car- 
ing for the young animals. At Amman we saw the 
ruins of the magnificent temple and other pubhc 
buildings with which it was adorned by Ptolemy 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 195 

adelphus, when he rebuilt it and called it, after 
himself, Philadelphia. 

The country north of Amman was more interest- 
ing and attractive than that which we had already 
traversed, with larger features, plains and valleys. 
Soon after we started we came to a long narrow 
plain so green and so nearly covered with grazing 
flocks that I have thought that the author of Zech. 9 
must have had such a scene in mind when he wrote, 
as I read v. 16: 

*'Then will Yahweh, their God, save them; 
Like a flock will he feed his people: 
Like stars for a crown shall they be. 
Glittering on his soil." 

At another point we had to climb down into a 
valley like an immense bowl, only to chmb out of 
it on the other side, and presently to make another 
deep descent to the swift and noisy Jabbok, where 
we lunched among the oleanders lining its banks, 
before finishing our ride for the day at Jerash. 

When we reached these famous ruins we saw that 
they would pay us for all the trouble and expense 
the trip had cost us. We therefore made arrange- 
ments to stay a second day and use it to the best 
advantage possible. Even so we had to content 
ourselves with the most important objects and the 
impressions derived from them. We could not but 



196 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

be struck with the plan of the city, or that (western) 
part of it of which there are still valuable remains, 
with its oval forum surrounded by Ionic columns, 
near the southern end, and the colonnade extending 
from it to the northern gate. Next we were at- 
tracted by the temples, especially the great one, of 
which there remain nine colossal columns, on a 
platform from which they command the entire city; 
and the two theatres, both in sightly positions, 
many of whose seats are so well preserved that they 
seem to be only waiting for their audience. What 
would one not give — this is the thought that took 
possession of us as we studied those speaking frag- 
ments of antiquity — ^what would one not give for a 
day in the Gerasa of the second century. 

When we left Jerash we took a southwesterly 
direction. It gave us a favorable impression of 
the country through which we passed. That north 
of the Jabbok was rather rugged, but there was 
now and then a village, and the valleys seemed 
fairly fertile. It certainly was a recommendation 
that the hills were more or less clothed with small 
trees and bushes. South of the Jabbok there were 
considerable stretches that invited the plow. When 
we inquired why they were not tilled we were told 
that the people were leaving the country as rapidly 



TWO FRUITFUL YEARS 197 

as possible to escape the intolerable treatment to 
which they were subjected by the Turkish govern- 
ment. The war must have opened a door of hope 
to all that region ! 

We camped that night at es-Salt, but we left so 
early in the morning, that we did not see much of 
the place. The fact is, we had seen so much in our 
last five days that nothing now seemed more im- 
portant than to get to our camp in the garden of 
Hotel Bellevue at Jericho, especially when we 
thought of the heat and flies that we had yet to en- 
counter in the jungle along the Jordan. We sur- 
vived these, however, with four more torrid hours 
the next day, and arrived at Jerusalem before noon 
in tolerable condition. 

On all these trips, as well as in my walks about 
Jerusalem I made it my rule to photograph every 
scene or object which illustrated anything in the 
Bible. The result was that I was able to bring 
home between seven and eight hundred pictures, all 
of which were in one way or another valuable, and 
some remarkably interesting. My stock of photo- 
graphs, however, was not the measure of the illus- 
trative material that I had accimiulated. I had 
pages on pages of notes on our goings and doings. 
But, best of all, after nearly eight months in the 



198 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Holy Land, I had a store of impressions which 
have ever since made me feel more at home in the 
Bible than in any other literature. 

My work in Palestine done, on the fourth of 
June we left Jerusalem and made our way to 
Germany where we spent nearly a month, the first 
few days at Rothenburg enjoying its medieval 
architecture and a musical festival, and the rest 
in Leipzig, refreshing oiu- hungry souls at that 
then universally recognized centre of learning and 
music. Our only other stop of any length was one 
in London. We could not withstand the lure of 
that great metropoUs on our way to Liverpool 
and America. 



A LEGISLATIVE MUDDLE 

I have mentioned certain reasons which, after 
my confirmation in 1900, led me to hope that I 
should at last be permitted to pursue my work in 
comparative peace. As time passed I thought 
there was another in the fact that most of those 
who signed the last complaint had ceased their 
agitation and one of the leaders had asked to be 
reinstated and had returned to the University for 
a philosophical course. This, however, was a mis- 
take, for, in March 1901, H. W. Peck, the bitter- 
est and most reckless of my former accusers, and 
others, residents in southern California, began a 
new campaign with the pubhcation of a periodical 
called The Methodist Outlook. The date of the 
first number of this organ is important, because 
it shows that, whereas I have been accused of 
bringing upon myself a renewal of the agitation 
against me by publishing The World Before Abra- 
ham, the campaign had been more than six 
months under way when that work appeared. The 
first two numbers were entirely devoted to me 
and my heresies. In the first the old charge that 
I was a Unitarian was revived and the old state- 

199 



200 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

ments rightly or wrongly attributed to me repeated, 
as if they had never been answered. In the second 
it was my teaching concerning the Sabbath that 
was attacked. In the third, the only other that I 
have ever seen, the Moses and the Prophets of 
Professor Terry, of Garrett BibUcal Institute, as 
well as my World before Abraham, was placed 
in the indecc eoopurgatorius, I found some comfort 
in the fact that a man so well known and so 
highly respected had become so outspoken as he 
was in this volimae ; for I thought that fewer would 
be likely to join a movement against the two of 
us and the schools we represented; also that those 
who did would be less likely to accomplish their 
purpose. It was partly for these reasons and 
partly because I was tired of controversy that I 
paid little attention to this new campaign, even 
when effects of it showed themselves in articles 
in the rehgious papers and resolutions passed by 
the western conferences. I will give, as a sample 
of the style and content of these resolutions, those 
of the Southern California Conference, of the fall 
of 1901 : 

"Whereas, certain professors of the Theological 
Seminary are teaching doctrines contrary to the 
Word of God and the doctrines of the Methodist 
Episcopal Church, therefore: 

Resolved: That the Southern Cahfomia Con- 



A LEGISLATIVE MUDDLE 201 

ference does hereby express its emphatic disap- 
proval of such teachings, and that we withdraw 
from the Boston Theological Seminary our en- 
dorsement as a conference, and that we advise our 
young men to attend some other theological school. 
Resolved: That a copy of these resolutions be 
sent to the Secretary of the Board of Bishops and 
to the California and New York Christian Advo- 
cates for publication." 

These species of propaganda continued through- 
out the two years following my return from Pales- 
tine, but I followed the rule I had previously ob- 
served and steadfastly refrained from answering 
any of these direct or indirect attacks, except in 
one instance, when I wrote to a prominent man on 
the Pacific Coast whom I had known as a student, 
expressing my surprise that any one who knew me 
could believe the things that he seemed to have 
accepted with reference to my character and opin- 
ions. 

The course that I had taken and the faith that 
prompted it seemed justified, at the time, by the 
action of the General Conference of 1904, to which, 
as will appear, numerous protests and petitions 
on the subject of the theological schools, especially 
that in Boston, had been presented. This was the 
report of the Conmiittee on Education, to which 
they were referred, and the verdict of the Confer- 
ence by a large majority: 



202 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

"Your Committee, to which were referred various 
memorials relating to the character of the teaching 
in our theological schools, have carefully examined 
the statements contained in these memorials and re- 
port as follows: 

First. We are persuaded that there is no suffi- 
cient foundation for the allegation that certain of 
our theological schools are disloyal to the doctrines 
of the Church. None of the memorials received 
contain any specific charges, and there have come 
to the Committee statements as to the doctrinal 
soundness of the teachings in one of these institu- 
tions in the reports of numerous official visitors 
appointed by the annual conferences. 

Second. In view, however, of the unrest that 
the memorials disclose as existing in some portions 
of the Church on the subject, we suggest and recom- 
mend: 

(a) The General Conference has declared the 
theological schools to exist for the entire Church, 
and the schools themselves have, by charter or 
otherwise, given the Bishops the right to nominate 
or confirm the election of professors in the various 
departments, which right the Bishops have repeat- 
edly exercised. 

(b) We, therefore, again commend the theo- 
logical seminaries of the Church to the careful su- 
pervision of the Board of Bishops, to the end that 
the Church may be protected from erroneous teach- 
ings and the schools from unwarrantable assaults. 

(c) The Bishops are hereby counseled not to 
nominate or confirm any professor in our theolog- 
ical schools concerning whose agreement with our 
theological standards they have a reasonable doubt. 



A LEGISLATIVE MUDDLE 203 

(d) The Bishops are hereby authorized and 
directed, whenever specified charges of misteach- 
ing in any of our theological schools are made in 
writing, by responsible parties, members or min- 
isters of the Church, to appoint a committee of 
their own number, to investigate such charges, 
whose report, if adopted by the Bishops, shall be 
transmitted to the Trustees of the theological 
school involved for proper action in the premises. 

(e) We urge that the Bishops diligently strive 
to allay all undue irritation upon this subject and 
'maintain and set forth quietness, love and peace 
among all men.' 

Third. We admonish all instructors in our 
schools to studiously avoid, as far as possible, all 
occasion of misunderstanding of their doctrinal 
attitude, both in their oral teaching and in their 
publications, and that they counsel their pupils to 
carefully avoid statements which would disturb the 
faith of those to whom they minister. 

Fourth. We deprecate the dissemination of 
distrust in the Church by indiscriminate and in- 
definite attacks upon religious teachers and theo- 
logical institutions. The Discipline of our Church 
provides ample tests for determining the doctrinal 
soundness of preachers and teachers. All charges 
•of erroneous teaching should be presented to the 
proper tribunal, where they can be legally tried, 
and where the rights of both the accuser and the 
accused are fully protected by constitutional safe- 
guards." 

This report was evidently prepared with some 
care and the best intentions, and any action based 



204* FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

thereon was at the time supposed to furnish ade- 
quate protection both for the Church and its the- 
ological teachers. Really, however, it was self- 
contradictory and introduced confusion into the 
question of jurisdiction, of which my pursuers were 
prompt to take advantage. The final paragraph 
says: "The Discipline of our Church provides 
ample tests for determining the doctrinal soimd- 
ness of preachers and teachers, and all charges of 
erroneous teaching should be presented to the 
proper tribunal, where they can be legally tried, 
and where the rights of both the accuser and the 
accused are fully protected by constitutional safe- 
guards." This, of course, refers to the Annual 
Conference, yet in preceding paragraphs the the- 
ological seminaries are commended "to the careful 
supervision of the Board of Bishops," and the 
Bishops are "authorized and directed, whenever 
specific charges of misteaching in any of our the- 
ological schools are made in writing, by responsi- 
ble parties, ministers or laymen of the Church, to 
appoint a committee of their own number, to in- 
vestigate such charges, whose report," whether 
adopted or rejected by the Bishops, would be a 
decision on the matter at issue, and therefore, of 
course, an invasion of the jurisdiction of the Annual 
Conference. This was finally discovered, but not 



A LEGISLATIVE MUDDLE 205 

until some one had suffered, although, as is evi- 
dent from the tone of this report, if his ease had 
been submitted to the General Conference, the 
charges against him would have been dismissed. 



THE WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM 
ASSAILED 

The new rules with reference to cases of mis- 
teaching in the theological schools were enacted in 
May, 1904. In November of the same year new 
charges, or the old charges under more or less 
new forms, were submitted to the Bishops, the ob- 
ject of presenting them at this particular time be- 
ing to prevent the confirmation of my election for 
a fifth term to my professorship. They were 
signed by H. W. Peck and six associates, presum- 
ably the same who had backed him in the publica- 
tion of the Methodist Outlook. I have not space 
for the whole of this paper, but I will give the 
charges and the specifications, the latter being al- 
most entirely excerpts from The World Before 
Abraham, but omit the "corroborative and inter- 
pretative evidence," which consists mostly of refer- 
ences to statements which have already been an- 
swered. 

206 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM ASSAILED 207 

The Charges and Specifications 

"To THE Bishops of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church. 

Dear Fathers and Brethren: — 

Whereas, by the unanimous action of the last 
General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church, held in Los Angeles, California, the fol- 
lowing instructions were given: — 

'The Bishops are hereby counseled not to nom- 
inate or confirm any professor in our theological 
schools concerning whose agreement with our theo- 
logical standards they have a reasonable doubt. 
The Bishops are hereby authorized and directed, 
whenever specific charges of misteaching in any of 
the theological schools of our Church are made in 
writing, by responsible parties, members or min- 
isters of the Church, to appoint a committee of 
their own number to investigate such charges, 
whose report, if adopted by the Bishops, shall be 
transmitted to the Trustees of the theological 
school involved for proper action in the premises.' 

Therefore, we, the undersigned ministers and 
members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
submit the following teachings of Dr. Hinckley 
G. Mitchell, of Boston University School of 
Theology, charging that they are not in 'agree- 
ment with our doctrinal standards,' and are derog- 
atory to the Person of our God and Savior Jesus 
Christ, and are destructive, in tendency, and in 
fact, of the authority and reliability of His state- 
ments, and Teachings, and those of the Word of 
God, and ask that an investigation be made con- 



208 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

cerning them, and that 'proper action in the prem- 
ises' be taken: — 

He denies; in effect and in fact, the deity of 
Jesus Christ, as set forth in the second article of 
religion of the Methodist Episcopal Church, in 
the word of God, and by Jesus Christ Himself, 

Specification 

'The truth is, that Jesus never claimed to be om- 
niscient, but, on the other hand, on at least one 
occasion (Mark 13, 32) confessed that his knowl- 
edge was hmited. There is, therefore, no impiety 
in facing the possibility of discovering another ex- 
ample of such limitation, and asking in all humility 
and reverence, whether the Pentateuch can have 
been written by Moses'; etc. The World Before 
Abraham, p. 16f. 

'In the first place, I am accused of denying the 
omniscience of Jesus. The subject is one that does 
not properly belong in my department. Conse- 
quently, I discuss it only incidentally in connection 
with the references to our Lord to the Pentateuch. 
When I say, as I do, that the Jews of his time 
universally believed the Pentateuch to have been 
written by Moses, and that, although, as most 
modern scholars maintain, the books comprising it 
are the work of later authors, he used the custom- 
ary phraseology with reference to it, the question 
always arises, how this fact is to be interpreted. 
I suggest two ways of explaining it, viz.: that he 
knew Moses did not write it, but, for easily imag- 
ined reasons, refrained from correcting the pre- 
vailing opinion; or, that this is a case like that in 
Mark 13, 32, in which his knowledge is limited. 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM ASSAILED 209 

See also Luke 2, 52. I give the students the choice 
of these two alternatives, frankly expressing my 
preference for the latter. I have no hesitation in 
saying, with many other scholars, that I do not 
think Jesus in his humiliation was omniscient. 
Wesley seems to have held the same opinion. 
In his 'Notes' on the passage cited, 'neither the 
son,' he says, 'Not as man; as man he was no more 
omniscient than omni-present.' He adds, 'But as 
God he knew all the circumstances of it.' How he 
reconciled this second with his first statement, he 
does not explain. Principal Fairbairn, who him- 
self denies the omniscience of Christ in his early 
life, characterizes such a conjunction of doctrines 
as 'the worst of all forms of docetism.' Professor 
Mitchell's Reply to his Accusers, p. 3f. 

He also denies; in effect and in fact, the deity of 
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, by teaching 
that not only was He ignorant concerning the 
human authorship of, and the events and facts 
connected with, the giving of His own laws, 
commandments and ordinances, as recorded in 
the Pentateuch, hut that He taught His erro- 
neous views, supposing them to he the truth, to 
His disciples and through them to the church of 
all time; and that he (Hinckley G. Mitchell) has 
the truth concerning those things, thus exalting 
himself, in knowledge, above Jesu^ Christ, and 
the authority and reliability of his views above 
those of the eternal Son of God. 

Specification 

'Jesus and his early disciples were Jews, and, as 
such, shared to a greater or less extent the tradi- 



210 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

tional opinions of their countrymen. They would 
naturally, therefore, think and speak of the Penta- 
teuch as the work of Moses. That they did actu- 
ally thus think and speak, it is easy to show. The 
Evangelists, e. g., themselves use the same terms in 
referring to the Pentateuch as the other Jews, and 
they represent their Master as employing them. 
He uses the terms 'law of Moses' (Luke 24, 44), 
and 'book of Moses' (Mark 12, 26), but generally, 
when he refers to the Pentateuch, he employs the 
briefer 'Moses,' and that in such a way as to indi- 
cate that the book and the man are associated in his 
mind in the relation of the work to the author. 
When the Gospel spread among the gentiles, they 
received with it the Old Testament and the tradi- 
tions then current respecting its origin. Thus the 
Jewish doctrine of the Mosaic authorship of the 
Pentateuch became the doctrine of the Christian 
Chm^ch, in which, for fifteen centuries, it was trans- 
mitted almost unquestioned.' The World Before 
Abraham, p. 14f. 

'The outcome, then, of the investigation under- 
taken is, that, although in parts of the Bible the 
Pentateuch is attributed to Moses, and such was 
for centuries the teaching of the Christian as well 
as the Jewish Church, the doctrine is based upon a 
mistaken tradition; the truth being that this so- 
called 'law of Moses' is a composite work, the 
growth of the entire period from Moses to Ezra. 
This conclusion, being based upon the best of evi- 
dence, will have to be accepted, however it may 
effect the authority of the Pentateuch or the re- 
nown of its supposed author.' The World Before 
Abraham, p. 66. 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM ASSAILED 211 

NEW TESTAMENT 

His denials, in effect and in fact, of the histori- 
city of Biblical Records, of the reality of the 
personages, of the authority of plain, Biblical 
statements of fact, of the truthfulness of the 
statements made in the Old Testament concern- 
ing some of the personages, events, and facts de- 
clared by the New Testament writers and our 
Lord and Savior Jesus Christ to have been his- 
toric, real, and the records concerning them trust- 
worthy, and used by Him and them as the 
ground and basis of doctrines fundamental to 
our faith are: — 

(a) Destructive of the authority and reliability 
of the new Testament statements of fact, 

(b) Destructive of any reliance upon the Divine 
Inspiration and Guidance 'into all the Truth' 
(John 16, 13) promised by the Son of God to, 
and claimed by, the New Testament writei^s. 

(c) Destructive of the moral and religious 
value of all New Testament doctrines and teach- 
ings based upon fictitious foundations, and ac- 
credited to the church by such unreliable guid- 
ance of the Holy Spirit. 

(d) And not in agreement with 'our doctrinal 
standards' as set forth in the fifth, sixth, 
seventh and eighth articles of religion of the 
Methodist Episcopal Church. 

Specification 

'The discussion just concluded has shown that, 
although the Pentateuch itself does not claim to 



212 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

have been written by Moses, and earlier authori- 
ties persistently ignore its existence, the New Tes- 
tament, as well as the later books of the Old, at- 
tribute it to him, and this is the traditional doctrine 
both of the Jewish and the Christian Church. The 
question now arises whether the testimony of the 
last two authorities is to be accepted as decisive. 
There are those who reply without hesitation in the 
affirmative, arguing that even the latest of the 
sacred writers were so much nearer the Mosaic 
age than modern scholars that it is an imperti- 
nence in the latter to question the statements or im- 
plications of the former; that this impertinence 
becomes presumption in view of the inspiration of 
the writers quoted ; and that the offense amounts to 
impiety when Jesus' relation to the subject is 
considered. The arguments are as weak as they 
are unfair. In reply to the first it is only neces- 
sary to say that if, as is generally admitted, the 
value of testimony depends upon the distance of 
the witness from the event to which he testifies, it 
certainly is not favorable to the traditional doctrine 
that the support for it comes from witnesses none 
of whom hved within a thousand years of the time 
of Moses. The second argument takes for granted 
that inspiration implies infallibility; a doctrine 
for which there is no ground in reason or experi- 
ence, and of which there is no example in the history 
of revelation.' The World Before Abraham, p. 16. 
*The Evangelists themselves connect the name 
of Moses with the Pentateuch as a whole, Luke 24, 
27: John 1, 17, 45; with a particular passage, Luke 
2, 23. Other Jews are represented as attributing 
to Moses the Pentateuch as a whole, John 9, 28f.; 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM ASSAILED 213 

particular passages, Matt. 19, 7, (Mark 10, 4) ; 
22, 24 (Mark 12, 19; Luke 20, 28) ; John 8, 5. 
Jesus is represented as connecting the name of 
Moses with the Pentateuch as a whole. Matt. 23, 2 ; 
Luke 16, 29, 31; 24, 44: John 5, 45f.; 7, 19; with 
particular passages, Matt. 8, 4 (Mark 1, 44; Luke 
5, 14) ; 19, 8 (Mark 10, 3) ; Mark 7, 10; 12, 26 
(Luke 20, 37) ; John 7, 22f. The World Before 
Abraham, p. 14, note. 

' Yahweh, therefore, must have forbidden the first 
man to eat of the fruit of the tree in the middle of 
the garden, without informing him what its effect 
would be and thus suggesting an inducement to 
disobedience.' The World Before Abraham, p. 
134. 

'The presence of the tree of knowledge of good 
and evil in the garden, in view of its attractiveness, 
was in itself a temptation. This, however, was not 
sufiicient. The force of the divine prohibition, 
which would naturally operate to prevent disobedi- 
ence, must in some way be neutralized. This is 
accomplished through the intervention of the 
SERPENT. The question who, or what, was the 
serpent, has been variously answered.' The World 
Before Abraham, p. 141. 

'A favorite theory is that the serpent was a mask 
for Satan. It is at least as old as the book of 
Wisdom (2, 23f.; see also Rom. 16, 20; Rev. 12, 9; 
20, 2; but comp. 2 Cor. 11, 3) . Some modern ex- 
egetes (Delitzsch) are very strenuous in their in- 
sistence upon it; but it cannot be maintained.' 
The World Before Abraham, p. 142. 

'The story of the Fall, in its Hebrew form, was 
clearly intended to be taken literally; hence the in- 



214 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

terpretation adopted in the foregoing conunents. 
It is possible that some who admit the correctness 
of this method of interpreting it will continue to 
regard it as veritable history; but most thoughtful 
people will feel obliged to question or deny the 
correctness of the account of the origin of evil here 
given,' etc. The World Before AbrahaTn, p. 159. 

'The first sin, although, so far as can be learned 
from the record, it did not disorganize human na- 
ture, as it has sometimes been represented to have 
done, and, although the ills by which it was pun- 
ished remained as a warning against further 
offenses, was followed by others, until the race be- 
came a race of evil-doers.' The World Before 
Abraham, p. 160. 

'There are those who still find reason for believ- 
ing that the names of this genealogy (Adam to 
Noah) represent real persons, and that each lived 
the number of years he is reported to have lived. 
See Murphy; Dawson, E. L. W., 84. These 
theses, however, cannot be maintained.' The 
World Before Abraham, p. 188. 

'These considerations (reasons that are omitted) 
show that, from the strictly historical standpoint, 
the chapter is of little value. In reality it is a more 
or less artificial scheme, probably suggested by the 
list of mythological kings who reigned before the 
Babylonian deluge, by which, in the absence of 
more reliable data, the author undertook to connect 
his doctrine concerning the origin of the world with 
the more historical parts of his narrative,' etc. The 
World Before Abraham, p. 189. 

'This list (Shem to Terah), like that of chapter 
V, ends with a father who has three sons. Here, 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM ASSAILED 215 

too, as in the preceding case, the author gives the 
age, SEVENTY YEARS, of the father when the first 
son was born. The three sons of Terah were 

ABRAHAM, NAHOR, and HARAN. 

'The reasons for doubting the historicity of the 
table in chapter v., with a single exception (3), 
apply to this one. Moreover, by reducing the age 
of paternity, without correspondingly reducing the 
total of years, the author exposes himself to an 
objection quite as serious as the one he has avoided. 
It is also incredible that all the persons — taking for 
granted that the names represent persons — here 
mentioned, including Abraham, were born forty- 
eight years before any of them died ; and that Ebher 
survived seven years after Joseph had been sold 
into Egypt.' The World Before Abraham, 
p. 275f. 

'It is therefore probable that a local inundation 
was the common foundation of the three accounts 
(of the Flood). It must have occurred long be- 
fore 2348 B. C, the date of the Flood according 
to the Priestly Narrator, as appears from the fact 
that the hero of the event is the last of ten (Baby- 
lonian) kings of the prehistoric period. This 
means that neither of the three accounts can be 
regarded as strictly historical.' The World Be- 
Fore Abraham, p. 226. 

'The sign chosen he calls my bow. This expres- 
sion reminds one of the Hindoo myth in which the 
bow used by Indra, when the storm is over, becomes 
the rainbow, a sign of peace to mankind. See 
Dillmann. This bow God promises to place, not 
once for all, but, as the next verse explains, at in- 
definite intervals, in the clouds, to serve as a re- 



216 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

minder of the covenant now established. The au- 
thor apparently thought that hitherto there had 
been no such thing as a rainbow.' The World Be- 
fore Abraham, p. 224. 

'The purpose of the sign is now stated: that i, 
not mankind, may remember the covenant, and 
that, as a result, the water may not continue to 
fall so long as to become a flood destroying all 

FLESH. 

'This verse (16) repeats the thought of the last 
two, emphasizing the anthropomorphic features of 
the representation." The World Before Abraham 
p. 225. 

OLD testamj:nt 

He denies, in effect and in fact, the reality of 
many of the Old Testament 'personages, the 
authority and reality of many of its plain state- 
ments of fact. He also, in effect and in fact, 
charges the authors of the Pentateuch and 
Joshuu with deception and fraud in the state- 
ments they make concerning God's Revelation 
through Moses of His Laws, Commandments 
and Statutes, 

Specification 

He denies the existence of the patriarchs from 
Adam to Abraham, inclusive. See The World 
Before Abraham, pp. 188, 189, 275, 276. 

He denies that God revealed to Moses the laws, 
commandments and statutes attributed to him in 
the Pentateuch. 

He also denies the Pentateuchal statements as 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM ASSAILED 217 

to when and where its laws, commandments and 
statutes were given. 

See The World Before Abraham, p. 66, para- 
graph beginning, *The outcome, then,' etc. 

'I think it is pretty generally conceded by bibli- 
cal scholars that deception was not considered a 
sin among the early Hebrews. In I Kings 22, 22 
Jehovah is represented as sending a lying spirit to 
deceive Ahab.' Dr. Mitchell's letter to President 
Warren. See Students' pamphlet p. 16. 

Respectfully submitted, 
(Signed) 

R. C. Powers, Layman. 
Harcourt W. Peck, Southern California 

Conference. 
S. A. Thomson, South California Conference. 
G. W. Coultas, South California Conference. 
J. W. Shenk, North Nebraska Conference. 
John W. Whittington, Layman. 
H. W. Brodbeck, Layman. 



THE JVOELD BEFORE ABRAHAM 
DEFENDED 

The complaint, the substance of which has been 
given in the preceding chapter was, as I have al- 
ready stated, made in November, 1904, but I did 
not see a copy of it until March 17, 1905. My 
answer, a brief one, was in the hands of the Presi- 
dent of the University the next day. It ran: 

"My dear Dr. Warren: 

I have just read the copy of the charges against 
me submitted to the Bishops by Harcourt W. 
Peck and others, which you sent me. It ought not 
to be necessary for me to reply to them, since 
substantially the same charges were fairly met and 
refuted in my defence of 1899, a copy of which I 
suppose, is in the hands of the Committee. Per- 
haps, however, it is advisable that I should call 
attention to a few points, lest my silence with refer- 
ence to them should be interpreted as a confession 
of judgment. 

In the first place it is clear that the charges are 
based on two fundamental assumptions ; viz : 

1. That Jesus in his humiliation was omniscient; 
and 

2. That the inspired authors of our Scriptiu^es 
were, by virtue of their inspiration, infallible. Of 
course, if these assumptions are correct, I am a 

218 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM DEFENDED 219 

heretic. But I maintain that, as I showed in the 
paper above cited, they are not only denied by our 
great founder, Wesley, but unwarranted by Scrip- 
ture or a rational Psychology, and I protest against 
being judged by such false standards." 

But I will not go farther with this paper, since 
my book was actually defended in one which ought 
to have been much more effective, and which, for- 
tunately, is available for my present purpose. 

When the charges in question were presented to 
the Bishops they were referred to a Committee of 
seven Bishops, of which the Chairman was Bishop 
Andrews. He went into the case thoroughly and 
prepared a paper which he, no doubt, read to his 
Committee, if not before the entire Board, and 
which he afterward placed at the disposal of my 
counsel, when, in 1906, 1 was obliged to meet similar 
charges in the Annual Conference. In 1909 it was 
published, with some unessential omissions, in Bish- 
op McConnelFs biography of his deceased col- 
league. I shall reproduce it more nearly entire, 
that I may not be suspected of suppressing any- 
thing prejudicial to my case. The following are 
the words of the Bishop: 

"The Case of Professor Mitchell. 

1. The action of the General Conference of 1904 
concerning the relation of the Bishops to theologi- 
cal professors was in two parts : 



220 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

(a) It counseled the Bishops not to nominate 
or confirm as theological professors persons con- 
cerning whose agreement with our doctrinal stand- 
ards they had reasonable doubt. 

(b) It authorized and directed the Bishops, 
'whenever specific charges of misteaching in any 
of our theological schools are made in writing by 
responsible parties, members or ministers of our 
Church, to appoint a committee of their own num- 
ber, whose report, if adopted by the Bishops, shall 
be transmitted to the Trustees of the theological 
school involved for 'proper action in the premises.' 

2. In November, 1904, the Bishops received 
from Rev. Harcourt W. Peck charges against the 
teachings of Professor Mitchell of the School of 
Theology of Boston University. Said charges 
were signed by four ministers and three laymen, 
all, presumably, living within the bounds of the 
Southern California Conference. Those of the 
ministerial signers (H. W. Peck, and J. W. Shenk, 
and G. W. Coultas) were active opponents of Pro- 
fessor Mitchell before his confirmation in May, 
1900. The charges were duly referred to Bishops 
Andrews, Foss, Fitzgerald, Spellmeyer, and Wil- 
son as a committee of investigation. 

3. It appears on examination of the charges that 
they do not allege any instance of misteaching in 
Professor Mitchell's classes since May, 1900. All 
of the charges are based on his book entitled The 
World Before Abraham, pubhshed in 1901, and 
on an extract from a letter written by him to Dr. 
W. F. Warren, President of Boston University, 
under date of December 1, 1899. A letter, how- 
ever, was placed in the hands of the Chairman of 
the Committee, written by T. A. Olsen to a Bro. 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM DEFENDED 221 

Cooke (no other indication of the person addressed 
being given), stating that the book, marked 'W. 
B. A.', is used in Professor Mitchell's classes. In- 
quiry being made of Professor Mitchell as to this 
point, he made answer as follows: 

*Dear Bishop: 

Yours of the 13th is received. In reply 
I can, of course, only state the facts, whatever may 
be the effect upon your Committee or the Board 
of Bishops. 

Instruction in the School of Theology has always 
been given largely by means of lectures in which 
the professors were expected to present their views, 
the students being required, after reciting on their 
notes, and doing a certain amount of collateral 
reading, to pass an examination on the subject 
under consideration. 

At first these lectures were delivered viva voce^ 
but now, to save time and the labor that it costs the 
student to take notes, it has become the practice 
among us to print our lectures or put them into 
typewTitten form expressly for our classes. I use 
the introductory pages of my World Before Abra- 
ham as the most convenient means of presenting to 
the Middle Class my views on the date and author- 
ship of the Pentateuch; but I require them, at the 
same time, to read Green's Higher Criticism of the 
Pentateuch and write an essay on it. Finally, 
I examine them, not on my views, but on the sub- 
ject studied, and mark them according to the ability 
they display, without reference to their attitude 
toward me or my teaching. 

After w^e have finished our discussion of the Pen- 
tateuch, — which requires only eight or ten hours, — 



222 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

The World Before Abraham is used only as a 
book of references. 

This is my method in my instruction in Amos 
and Isaiah. It is practically the method employed 
by all the most successful teachers in the School 
and the University, and I know of no other by 
which men and women can, with better results, be 
taught to love the truth and acquire conscientious 
and defensible convictions. Moreover, my pupils 
unanimously testify that it helps them to a pro- 
founder reverence for the Pentateuch as a revela- 
tion of the divine will. 

Sincerely yours, 
(Signed) H. G. Mitchell.' 

4. The direct evidence concerning Professor 
Mitchell's teachings cited from the W. B. A. and 
the letter to Dr. Warren, referred to above, is ac- 
companied by two lists of so-called corroborative 
and interpretative evidence. These consist (1) of 
two citations (by reference only) from Professor 
Mitchell's letters to Dr. Warren, of May 27, 1899; 
and December 1, 1899; (2) of one reference to 
the testimony of S. A. Cooke in the hands of 
Bishop Fowler; and (3) of references to the 
printed testimony of eight students in the School 
of Theology. (Here, following the statement 
that three of these eight had withdrawn their 
testimony, are given the names of three from 
whom letters had been received.) How far 
these citations of testimony printed in 1900 are 
pertinent to the investigation, now pending, of the 
character of Professor Mitchell's teaching since, 
in May, 1900, he was confirmed, with a quasi re- 
proof and admonition, by the Bishops, is a matter 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM DEFENDED 223 

for careful consideration. The question before us 
is this : Has the recent teaching of Professor Mit- 
chell tended to awaken suspicion and antagonism 
among the students and to create doubt as to essen- 
tial Cliristian verities? If the above cited testi- 
mony is to have weight, then the adverse testimony, 
that is, the testimony favorable to Professor 
Mitchell, now among the papers of the Secretary, 
which was before the Bishops in 1900, should be 
considered. They are, in part, the following: 

1. The explicit testimony of twenty-nine mem- 
bers of the class of thirty-eight members for the 
year 1898-9 as to the spirit, the method, and the 
soundness of Professor Mitchell's teaching. 

2. The urgent representation in his favor by 
nearly a hundred members of the New England 
Conference, among whom we note the name of al- 
most every leading member of the Conference. 

3. The appeal for his confirmation of nine pres- 
idents, and thirty-four members of the Faculty of 
Syracuse University. 

4. Favorable representations by graduates of the 
years previous to 1899. 

5. Discriminating between the allegations of fact 
made in the paper and the accompanying theologi- 
cal inferences drawn by the complainants, we find 
the allegations to be these four : 

(1) Professor Mitchell teaches that Moses is 
not the author of the Pentateuch, as we now have 
it, it being a composite work, the growth of the 
entire period from Moses to Ezra. 

(2) Professor Mitchell declares his opinion that 
Jesus in his humiliation was not omniscient. 

(3) Professor Mitchell teaches that the first 
eleven chapters of Genesis are not strictly histori- 



224 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

cal, this statement applying to the account of crea- 
tion, of the temptation and fall of Adam and Eve, 
of the succession and length of life of the antedilu- 
vians, of the universality of the Deluge, and of 
some of the genealogical table from Adam to Noah. 

(4) Professor Mitchell, in denying the Mosaic 
authorship of the Pentateuch, denies that God gave 
to Moses some of the laws and statutes, as recorded 
in the Pentateuch, and that he gave them at the 
times and under the circumstances under which 
these laws and statutes are said to have been given. 

It will be observed that Professor Mitchell is not 
accused in the paper referred to of teachings con- 
trary to our standards of doctrine as to the central 
and vital articles of our creed; namely, the being, 
character and government of God; the deity of 
Christ (except by implications hereinafter to be 
examined) ; the personality and deity of the Holy 
Spirit; faith as the one condition of salvation; the 
Church and the sacraments; and future and final 
rewards and punishments. He is supposed to be 
ready to affirm, in the usual certificate, his conform- 
ity to the doctrines and polity of the Methodist 
Episcopal Church. 

6. The questions before the Committee seem to 
be these two : 

( 1 ) Are the allegations of fact sustained by ade- 
quate evidence? 

(2) If sustained, in whole or in part, do they 
sustain the charge of 'mist caching,' of teaching 
contrary to our doctrinal standards? Let us ex- 
amine the allegations and evidence in the order 
given above. 

I. 7. Does Professor Mitchell teach that Moses 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM DEFENDED 225 

is not the author of the Pentateuch, as we now have 
it? 

Unquestionably. The W. B. A. repeatedly and 
unmistakably avows this opinion. Let, however, a 
more particular statement be made. 

1. In W. B. A. Professor Mitchell distinctly rec- 
ognizes Moses as the 'inspired' founder, lawgiver, 
and hero of Israel. 

2. He distinctly recognizes portions of the Pen- 
tateuch as having by divine command been com- 
mitted to writing by Moses. 

3. In W. B. A. he expresses no doubt that 
other portions of the Pentateuch in which it is re- 
corded that 'the Lord spake unto Moses,' and in 
which are narrated passages of the early history of 
Israel under the leadership of Moses, are true 
records of fact, whensoever and by whomsoever 
they were first committed to writing. 

4. The opinion that Moses did not write the Pen- 
tateuch, as we now have it, though contrary to the 
opinion prevalent in our Church, cannot be shown 
to be contrary to the standards of doctrine ; namely, 
the Articles of Religion, the Catechism, and (so 
far as the present writer knows) Mr. Wesley's 
first fifty-three sermons. 

5. Nor is the opinion incompatible, as very many 
personal instances show, with a genuine and hearty 
faith in the divine origin, authority, and truth of 
the Christian religion according to the evangelical 
interpretation thereof. 

6. The opinion of the Jewish Church contempor- 
aneous with Christ is not conclusive on the question 
before us, nor even that of the sacred writers, ex- 
cept upon the theory that inspiration made all of 



226 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

them infallible, not in theological truth only, but 
also in all matters, historical, genealogical, scienti- 
fic, to which they may allude — a theory which seems 
to be less largely and less firmly held than in years 
gone by. 

7. The question of the sources, authorship and 
authority of the Pentateuch is of very great moment 
to the Christian thought and hf e. It should there- 
fore be dealt with reverently, cautiously, even with 
great solicitude, lest vital truth in any way be ob- 
scui^ed. But the question is under most critical 
study by many men, some of them doubtless indif- 
ferent and hostile to revealed religion, but many 
of them devout, reverent, believing, as well as schol- 
arly. It is an open question. But it will be finally 
settled in the forum of Christian reason. 

Meanwhile the advice of Neander to the Prus- 
sian government, that the Life of Christ by 
Strauss, the skeptic, should not be put under the 
ban of authority, but should be met only by argu- 
ment, should have place with us. The truth is 
mighty and will prevail. 

II. 8. Does Professor Mitchell teach that in his 
opinion Jesus in his humiliation was not omniscient? 
Unquestionably. See W. B. A. pp. 16, 17. Yet 
he declares that he leaves his pupils free to choose 
between this and another theory in explaining the 
allusions of Christ to the Mosaic authorship of the 
Pentateuch, as found in the New Testament. In 
the bill of charges by many and emphatic state- 
ments, it is set forth that the holding of this opin- 
ion as to the possible limitation of l:nowledge, in 
the humiliation, of Jesus is tantamount to the de- 
nial of his deity, and of all doctrines founded 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM DEFENDED 227 

thereon. Must this position be admitted? It is a 
sufficient answer to this question to cite the names, 
in some cases, the words, of men of unquestioned 
orthodoxy, of piety, and learning who have held 
or treated with deference the opinion which Pro- 
fessor Mitchell avows. (In its full dogmatic form 
this theory is called the Kenosis, 'the emptying him- 
self,' of Phil, ii) I have not noticed that Professor 
Mitchell has avowed any general theory of the 
Kenosis; he seems only to have spoken of particu- 
lar cases of limitation of knowledge in Jesus. 
While, therefore, the theory of the Kenosis may in- 
clude his view, he cannot be held responsible for the 
theory as a whole. 

Citations 

1. Dr. Whedon, in Methodist Review, 1861, p. 
148 (abridged). 'A highly important contribu- 
tion to the history of modern theology has been 
furnished by J. Bolenmeyer's Doctrine of the Ken- 
osis, a doctrine which has gained a number of ad- 
herents among the Lutheran theologians of Ger- 
many. According to it, the Logos, at his incarna- 
tion, voluntarily divested himself of his divine self- 
consciousness, in order to develop himself in purely 
human form. On account of the importance which 
is attributed to it by a large nimiber of theologians 
it well deserves to be made the subject of a special, 
thorough work.' 

2. Dr. Whedon, in Methodist Review, 1870, p. 
291 (abridged). 'The first article (in Bibliotheca 
Sacra), by Professor Reubelt, is learned and able, 
in favor of what is called the Kenosis. . . . We are 
not disposed to dogmatize on such a subject. We 



228 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

must speak with respect of a dogma held by Dorner, 
Pressense and by Dr. ISTast.' Dr. Whedon then 
proceeds to controvert the doctrine. 

3. In Methodist Review for 1897, pp. 229-246, 
Dr. M. J. Cramer argues at length the limitation 
of knowledge in Jesus during his humiliation; and 
in the Methodist Review for 1904, pp. 234-236, 
G. P.Eckman, D. D., Pastor of St. Paul's Church, 
JSTew York, affirms with copious argument the same 
position. 

4. McClutock & Strong's Encyclopedia, article 
KenosiSj admits the difficulty, in its own language, 
of adjusting 'the God to the man,' argues against 
the Kenosis, but adds : 'The theory of a somewhat 
double consciousness, if we may so express it, or, at 
least, an occasional (and in early life prolonged) 
withdrawal of the divine cognitions from the human 
intellect . . . seems to be required to meet the vary- 
ing aspects under which the compound life of Jesus 
presents itself in the Gospels.' 

5. Dr. William Nast, founder of German Metho- 
dism, cited by Dr. Mitchell from vol. i of Commen- 
tary on Mark 13, 32 : 'To say that Christ as a man 
knoweth it not, but as God knoweth it, is self-con- 
tradictory. To know, and, at the same time, riot 
to know, a thing, would destroy the unity of the 
personality of the God-man, .... It was proper 
for him who became like unto us to be our pattern 
in his walking by faith, that, in the state of his hu- 
miliation, he should not know the completion of the 
aeon.' 

6. Three unquestionably orthodox commentaries 
in my library, in commenting on Luke 2, 40-52; 
Matt. 24, 36; and Mark 13, 32, distinctly and un- 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM DEFENDED 229 

equivocally affirm the real ignorance of Jesus in 
his childhood, and when he said in Matthew and 
Mark 'neither the son.' See (1) Alford, vol. i, 
pp. 217, 227; (2) Stier, Words of Jesus, vol. i, p. 
472; (3) Lange, Commentary on Mark, pp. 132- 
136. 

7. Neander, Life of Christ, p. 368 on Mark, 13, 
32. 'To know the time pre-supposes a knowledge 
of the hidden causes of events, of the actions and 
reactions of free agents — a prescience which none 
but the Father could have — unless we suppose, 
what Christ expressly denies, that he had received 
it by special divine revelation.' 

8. Dr. Luke H. Wiseman, former President of 
the British Wesleyan Conference, is cited in 
Homiletical Cyclopaedia, p. 148, as follows: 'In 
his youth, at least, Jesus grew in wisdom. His at- 
tainment of knowledge at that period of his life was 
progressive. Nor can we reasonably suppose it 
was otherwise afterwards. He learned obedience 
by the things which he suffered. 

9. Canon Gore, Dissertations, p. 94. 'We are 
forced to assert that within the sphere and period 
of his incarnate and mortal life he did — and, as it 
would appear, did habitually—. . . cease from the 
exercises of those divine functions and powers, 
including the divine omniscience, which would have 
been incompatible with a truly human experience.' 

10. Godet, Commentary, on John, i. p. 362. 
'Jesus no longer possesses on earth the attributes 
which constitute the divine state. Onmiscience he 
has not, for he asks questions and himself declares 
his ignorance on one point' (Mark, 13, 32). 

11. Gore, Dissertations, pp. 190, 191, cites, 
from Dr. Fairbairn a proof too long to be here 



230 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

quoted, which asserts most vigorously the same 
doctrine, in substance, which Gore asserts. On p. 
192 Gore also cites Bishop Martensen, the distin- 
guished Danish theologian, as holding a kenotic 
theory. 

12. Canon Gore also cites from Dean Church 
(p. 199) and Dr. Bight (201), distinguished 
English theologians, passages which, without care- 
ful definition, admit the possible limitation of 
knowledge in Christ. 

13. Bruce, Humiliation of Christ, p. 392, cites 
from Delitzsch: 'The incarnate Logos is not in 
possession of the eternal dooca, for he desires to 
regain it (John 17, 5). He is not omniscient, for 
he knows not, as he himself says, the day and hour 
of the end (Mark 13, 32) . He is not omnipotent,' 
etc. 

14. Henry Van Dyke, D.D., ex-Moderator of 
the Presbyterian General Assembly, in Gospel for 
an Age of Doubt, argues at length and earnestly 
for the doctrines of the Kenosis. 

15. He cites, p. 155, from Howard Crosby a full 
and strong passage which affirms the limitation of 
knowledge in Jesus from Bethlehem to Calvary. 

16. In Dr. Terry's Moses and the Prophets, 
Appendix, pp. 181-194, Dr. C. J. Little, of 
Garrett Biblical Institute, Dr. Samuel Plantz, of 
Lawrence University and Dr. B. P. Raymond, of 
Wesleyan University, distinctly avow their belief 
that the knowledge of Jesus in his humiliation was 
limited. 

17. To these add opinion of Robert W. Dale, of 
Birmingham, England. 

In closing these statements attention is called to 
the fact that no German theologian but Delitzsch 
has been either quoted or referred to. 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM DEFENDED 231 

These citations of opinion are made with the 
single purpose of showing that men of high reputa- 
tion for learning, piety, and orthodoxy have either 
held the opinion that the knowledge of Jesus 
during his humiliation was limited, or have held 
that such an opinion was not incompatible with 
faith in the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ. Great 
is the mystery of the incarnation. It is a depth 
in which human thought is lost. Whether we 
adopt or reject the theory of limitation, we are 
equally unable to explain how 'the Word became 
flesh'. And, in view of the citations made, it can- 
not be thought a fatal error to hold and to teach 
this theory, if it be done reverently and undogmat- 
ically. 

III. 9. Does Professor Mitchell teach that the 
first eleven chapters of Genesis are not to be con- 
sidered strictly historical? Unquestionably. See 
W. B. A. passim. He does not seem to base this 
opinion on the doctrine of evolution, which the W. 
B. A. nowhere treats, or even, so far as we have 
noticed, alludes to; nor on any theory of anti-super- 
naturalism. He rather finds support for it chiefly 
in (1) the variations found in the two accounts of 
creation, and also of the Flood: (2) in the failure, 
thus far, to reconcile Genesis and geolog\^: (3) in 
the peculiar incidents found in the accounts of the 
temptation and fall, and the resemblance between 
it and the myths common with many ancient 
people; and (4) in the incredible length of life 
assigned to individual antediluvians. I suppose 
all thinking men have struggled to some degree 
with the difliculties existing in these eleven 
chapters. We have given up the literal days, and 
have substituted for them indefinite aeons. We 



232 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS. 

have questioned whether the serpent, or, on the 
other hand, some infernal spirit in the guise of a 
serpent, or of a monkey, as Adam Clarke supposes, 
was the tempter. We have wondered whether the 
history of long-lived individual antediluvians ought 
not to be considered as rather the history of tribes 
or dynasties, or whether the so-called years of their 
lives were meant for smaller divisions of time ; and 
we no longer think of the Nochian Deluge as being 
universal, though it is said to have covered the 
'earth' and 'all the high mountains under heaven.' 
But in judging Professor Mitchell's teaching 
on this head, it is sufficient to consider that, in his 
opinion on the non-history of the eleven chapters, he 
represents the opinion of by far the larger propor- 
tion of the leading biblical scholars of the time. It 
would be difficult to name any large number of 
eminent and orthodox scholars familiar with 
modern critical studies whose views are not adverse 
to the strict historicity of the chapters. They find, 
as does Professor Mitchell, great religious truths 
concerning God, man, sin, judgment, preparation 
for redemption, put before us in forms more or 
less historical, but not to be treated as unerring 
history. I cite some of the names of these leaders 
of theological thought : 

In Germany, 

Professor Delitzsch, the champion of orthodoxy. 
Fritz Hommel, Munich. 

Tn Great Britain, 

Professor A. B. Davidson, Edinburgh. 
Marcus Dods, 
A. R. S. Kennedy, " 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM DEFENDED 233 

James Orr, Edinburgh. 
Rev. Dr. Stalker, Kilcaldy, Scot. 
Professor Henry Drununond. 

J. H. Bernard, Oxford. 
William Sanday, " 

A. H. Sayce, 
Principal Fairbairn, 

Caird, 
Bishop Byle, Manchester. 
Professor Findlay, Wesleyan. 
Ex-Pres. J. Shaw Bangs, Wesleyan. 
Rev. Hugh Price Hughes, " 

In America, 

President Cuthbert Hall, Union Theological 
Seminary. 
King, Oberlin College. 
C. J. Little, Garrett Biblical Insti- 
tute. 
Samuel Plantz, Lawrence Univer- 
sity. 

B. P. Raymond, Wesleyan Univer- 
sity. 

Strong, Rochester University. 
Professor W. IST. Clarke, Colgate University. 

C. F. Kent, Yale University. 
John McFadyan, Knox College. 
L. B. Paton, Hartford Theological 

Seminary. 
Israel Peritz, Syracuse University* 
F. K. Sanders, Yale University. 
Bishop J. W. Bashford. 
Rev. Dr. G. A. Gordon, Congregationalist, 
Boston. 



234 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

John P. Peters, New York City. 
W. Hayes Ward, " " 
[I have taken the liberty of re-arranging this 
list for convenience of reference.] 

IV. 10. In denying the Mosaic authorship of 
the Pentateuch does Professor Mitchell deny the 
statement of the Pentateuch, that God often gave 
laws to Moses, and that he did this at the times and 
under the cirumstances set forth in the narrative? 
The answer should be nay and yea. He does not 
deny — he does deny. 

1. Professor Mitchell does not deny, but holds, 
that Moses received from God laws and statutes 
for Israel; that Moses wrote various parts of 
the Pentateuch, including these and certain historic 
matters; and he implies his belief that other laws 
and statements were received by Moses from God, 
which were, perhaps, written down at a later date 
and by other hands. 

2. But Professor Mitchell holds that some parts 
of the Pentateuch said to come from God through 
Moses were framed and incorporated with preced- 
ing divine laws by men much later than Moses. 

How this supposed fact can be reconciled with a 
true ethical sense in those who thus, in the name of 
Moses, added to the laws of Moses, how the Jewish 
people came to accept the additions as from Moses, 
and how far, and in what manner, the credit of the 
Pentateuch and of the Old Testament is affected 
thereby, are among the difficult problems of modern 
scholarship. But here, as in the matters forego- 
ing. Professor Mitchell is in harmony with very 
eminent and orthodox scholars. 



WORLD BEFORE ABRAHAM DEFENDED 235 

11. Some communications have been placed in 
the hands of the Chairman to which attention 
should be given: — 

[The letters were from two gentlemen men- 
tioned by name and "representative students of 
former years", but are not given in the paper.] 

Undoubtedly there is unrest in the Church, re- 
sulting from the higher criticism. Probably the 
faith of some in the Christian religion is weakened 
thereby. In some cases the pulpit utters the 
Christian verities in a subdued tone. We lament 
it. We regret the simple and unquestioned con- 
fidence of former years in the literal truth of every 
word of the Scriptures. But the remedy is not in 
suppressing inquiry. That must, that will go on. 
It makes this a time of transition. But the aim, 
the spirit, the thoroughness of the inquiry will 
bring us good. Never was Christian scholarship 
more devout, more single of eye, more positive 
in evangelical conviction than now. Patience, 
prayer. Christian work will make the Church safe." 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 

There are many things that I might say in this 
connection, but I refrain, because to add them seems 
to me hardly fair in the circumstances. I am lay- 
ing my case before the reader for his judgment 
as to the justice of the charges and the disposition 
made of them. I question whether it would be 
fair to the plaintiffs further to discuss the charges 
without allowing them to appear in rebuttal, or to 
the Bishops to introduce evidence of which they 
may not have been in possession when their de- 
cision was rendered. I will therefore next intro- 
duce the report of that decision sent to the Trustees 
of the University. 

The matter was taken in hand at Louisville, Ky., 
where the Bishops had assembled for their May 
meeting of 1905. There were at that time, I be- 
lieve, fifteen active members in the Board. One 
of them was in China; the other fourteen, it was 
said, were at the meeting. Some of the retired 
bishops, also, were present; two as members of the 
Committee to which the charges had been referred 
in Novem'ber. The Committee reported on April 
26, and on May 1 the Board reached a decision, 

236 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 237 

of which the Trustees of the University were in- 
formed in the following communication; 

"Action of the Board of Bishops concerning 
Prof. H. G. Mitchell, D.D. May 1, 1905. 

The General Conference of 1904 adopted the 
following action: — 

'The Bishops are hereby coimseled not to nom- 
inate or confirm any professor in our theological 
schools concerning whose agreement with our 
doctrinal standards they have a reasonable doubt. 
The Bishops are hereby authorized and directed, 
whenever specific charges of misteaching in any of 
our theological schools are made, in writing, by re- 
sponsible parties, members or ministers of our 
Church, to appoint a committee of their own number 
to investigate such charges, whose report, if adopted 
by the Bishops, shall be transmitted to the Trustees 
of the school involved, for proper action in the 
premises.' 

Under this provision complaints against the 
teachings of Professor H. G. Mitchell, a professor 
in the School of Theology of the Boston University, 
presented to the Bishops last November, were care- 
fully investigated by a Committee of the Board 
appointed at that time. 

On April 26 that Committee reported to the 
Board of Bishops and, after full consideration and 
slight amendment, the report was adopted as 
follows : 
'To the Board of Bishops: 

The Committee appointed in November, 1904, to 
investigate certain complaints made in writing 
against the teachings of Hinckley G. Mitchell, 



238 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

D.D., a professor in the School of Theology of 
Boston University, signed by three laymen and 
four ministers of our Church, having carefully con- 
sidered the matter committed to them, respectfully 
report as follows: 

1. The evidence submitted to us is not sufficient 
to prove the first complaint, namely, that Professor 
Mitchell denies the deity of Christ. 

2. Some of the statements of Professor Mitchell 
concerning the historic character of the early 
chapters of the book of Genesis seem to us un- 
warranted and objectionable, and as having a ten- 
dency to invalidate the authority of other portions 
of the Scriptures. We therefore think there is 
some ground of complaint on this head contained 
in the paper laid before us. 

3. Having carefully considered the other matters 
presented in the complaint, we are of the opinion 
that item number 2 covers the case, and no further 
deliverance is necessary. 

Be it therefore resolved: 

1. That the Secretary of the Board of Bishops 
be, and is hereby, instructed to transmit to the 
Trustees of Boston University a copy of this state- 
ment, including the report on the complaints 
against Professor Mitchell for 'proper action in the 
premises.' 

2. That, having been notified by the Trustees of 
their action favoring the continuance of Professor 
Mitchell in his professorship, the Board of Bishops, 
as a matter of courtesy to the Trustees, and in view 
of the findings in item no. 2 of our report recited 
above, and of the reasonable inferences therefrom, 
respectfully returns the nomination of Professor 
Mitchell without action. 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 239 

The foYegoing is a true copy of the action of the 
Board of Bishops of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church, taken in their conference at Louisville, 
Ky., Monday, May 1, 1905. 

John M. Walden, 
Sec'y.'" 

The Bishops did not notify me of their action 
with reference to my confirmation, as they were 
required to do by a proviso attached to a report 
adopted by the General Conference of 1900 by 
which they were allowed to confirm elections to pro- 
fessorships in the theological schools by not fewer 
than a majority. Their report was read to the 
Trustees at a special meeting, May 11, by Bishop 
Goodsell, who interpreted it in such a way as to 
leave the impression, according to President Hunt- 
ington, "that the question of confirmation had not 
been closed by the Bishops." The Trustees, there- 
fore, "felt obliged to see that a careful review be 
made and a clear judgment formed" as to my fit- 
ness for the place to which I had been elected. 
The following Committee was chosen for this pur- 
pose: Ex-Governor John L. Bates, LL.D., Rev. 
J. W. Lindsay, D.D., Bev. Daniel Steele, D.D., 
Rev. Edward M. Taylor, D.D., Rev. Willard T. 
Perrin, Ph.D., Rev. John D. Pickles, Ph.D., 
Silas Peirce, Esq., and the President of the Uni- 
versity. 



240 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

The Trustees notified me officially of what the 

Bishops had done. I replied in the following 

paper : 

May 15, 1905. 
To the Trustees of Boston University: 
Gentlemen : 

I have, by your permission, carefully read the 
communication recently addressed to you by the 
Bishops, in which they announce the result of their 
consideration of the charges brought against me by 
the Rev. H. W. Peck and others to the effect that, 
in my teaching, as represented by the book entitled 
The World Before Abraham, I present views at 
variance with, and subversive of, the doctrines of 
the Methodist Episcopal Church. The rule made 
by the last General Conference, under which the 
action of the Bishops was taken, does not state that 
action under it is to be regarded as a final refusal 
to confirm the teacher whose orthodoxy is 
questioned. It really implies the contrary, and, in 
fact, it is clear from the language of this 
communication as well as the statements of individ- 
ual Bishops, that they acted on this understanding. 
Since then, they have not actually refused to con- 
firm my re-election, but only reported that, at 
present, there exists in the minds of some of them 
*a reasonable doubt' with reference to the sound- 
ness of my views, it seems to me proper to call your 
attention to certain considerations which justify 
you in re-electing me, and in reiterating your re- 
quest that I be confirmed in my professorship. 

In the first place, let me respectfully call your 
attention to the fact that, in the report sent you, the 
Bishops base the 'reasonable doubt' which they en- 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 241 

tertain on a general characterization of 'some of 
the statements' of my book, without indicating 
what particular statements are meant, or for what 
particular reason, or reasons, they should be con- 
sidered unsatisfactory; so that you really have no 
sufficient warrant for reconsidering the subject of 
my re-election. 

Secondly, the terms in which the statements in 
question are condemned are hardly in harmony with 
the requirements of the rule under which the 
Bishops claim to have acted. That instructs the 
Bishops to refuse to confirm when they find reason 
for doubting the agreement of a given teacher with 
'our doctrinal standards.' But one can hardly be 
considered in disagreement with certain standards 
unless the opinions held are shown to be condemned 
by such standards, and he who holds them to have 
admitted the fact. I submit with all deference 
that this condition has not been fulfilled. 

Thirdly since the Bishops declare the evidence 
submitted insufficient to prove me guilty of deny- 
ing the deity of Christ in the face of my repeated 
declarations on the subject, it seems inconsistent 
that they should not have given more weight than 
they did to my statements with reference to my 
faith in the divine origin and the supreme ex- 
cellence of our Bible. I have always taught — and 
there is nothing in The World Before Abraham, to 
indicate a contrary opinion — that the first chapters 
of Genesis cannot be explained without supposing 
that their author (or authors) enjoyed a measure 
of the influence of the divine Spirit of which, so far 
as I know, there are no traces in contemporaneous 
literature. All that can justly be alleged is that 
my criterion of inspiration is not historical or 



242 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

scientific accuracy, but religious value and signif- 
icance. 

Fourthly, it seems to me that the Bishops have 
not given proper importance to the evidence sub- 
mitted to show that, whatever one might a priori 
predict that the tendency of my views on the first 
chapters of Genesis would be, as a matter of fact 
they have not robbed the Scriptures, or any part 
of them, of any of their real value. I certainly 
should deny that it had had any such effect on me 
to hold them, or that any of my pupils had suffered 
in their faith through accepting them. I am con- 
stantly in receipt of letters from graduates of the 
School proving the contrary. Here is what the 
Rev. S. L. Stewart of Clyde, Ohio, one of the men 
who, ten years ago, as a student, signed a petition 
asking an investigation of my department, says in 
a letter just received: 

'I want to tell you that, as the years have gone, 
your work has become most valuable of all I took 
in the School of Theology. I could not see things 
then as you tried to explain them, but I know now 
it was only my immaturity of vision and scholar- 
ship. Ten years of hard study has convinced me 
that your viewpoint is the only one that can be 
maintained.' 

The members of the present Senior class, with 
one exception, and he explained his refusal as no 
reflection on my teaching, but the contrary, — 
recently signed a statement, which was sent to the 
Bishops during their recent meeting, in my favor. 

Finally, let me add a statement concerning my 
attitude in the present crisis. I, of course, think 
that the views presented in my book are correct; 
but, if any Trustee or Bishop, or other friend of the 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 243 

truth, will show me that I am in error in any case, I 
shall be glad to abandon them for better ones ; for I 
am neither afraid nor ashamed to change my mind. 
The methods I employ are the best and most 
successful I have been able to invent ; but I am not 
wedded to them, and I shall change them as soon as 
I learn how I can get as good or better results with- 
out offending anybody. I am naturally jealous 
for my department, but I should be willing — and 
I commend this suggestion to you — to have all my 
work, except the study of Hebrew in the first year, 
made elective, provided those who did not take it 
were required to take an equivalent amount of 
exegesis in the department of the New Testament. 
In fine, I am willing to make any concession that 
will not abridge my right as a scholar to think as 
I must and, with all fairness, charity, and loyalty, 
present the truth as I see it, and to the extent to 
which it seems to me vital, concerning the Old 
Testament, and the revelation of God's will and 
ways which I devoutly believe it to contain. 

I have written at this length, because, as I can 
prove in detail, the charges on which the action of 
the Bishops was based are mistaken and ground- 
less, and I should consider it an injustice to me, 
and a serious injury to the School of Theology and 
the Methodist Episcopal Church, if you endorsed 
them by withdrawing my name, and thus virtually 
branding me as a heretic before the world. I in- 
vite you to examine, as thoroughly as you will, me 
and my book, and the methods of my department, 
and convince yourselves of the justice of my con- 
tention. 

Respectfully submitted, 

H. G. Mitchell. 



244 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

How the Trustees met the situation, I will let 
President pSuntington tell in the words of his 
Annual Report, dated January 8, 1906. He says : 

"The Bishops did not attempt to define to the 
Trustees what definite action ought to be taken by 
them, in order that it should be 'proper action in 
the premises.' No hint was given as to what 
course the Trustees should pursue. This commit- 
tee of the Board, carefully selected, of representa- 
tive and competent men, was expected to review 
the case and prepare a report, which was to be 
passed upon by the Trustees and finally sent to 
the Board of Bishops, to convene in Washington 
Oct. 25, 1905. 

Four courses were open to the Trustees as re- 
presented by this committee: 

First, the committee might have considered that 
'proper action' would be to induce Dr. Mitchell 
to withdraw from his position in the University as 
professor-elect in the Faculty of the School of 
Theology. But how could the Trustees ask Dr. 
Mitchell to withdraw, when, after episcopal exam- 
ination, he had not been found guilty of any disa- 
greement with the doctrinal standards of the Meth- 
odist Episcopal Church? The single charge that 
was entertained by the Bishops against him did 
not relegate him to the limbo of heretics; for no 
standard of interpretation of the early chapters 
of Genesis has ever been published by the author- 
ity of the Methodist Episcopal Church for the di- 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 245 

rection of the thinking of its ministers and 
teachers. So that ever so gracious a request from 
the Trustees to Dr. Mitchell to withdraw from his 
place would have been groundless, impertinent, 
and absurd. 

Second, it might have been surmised by the com- 
mittee, that the Trustees should seek to prevail 
upon Dr. Mitchell to withdraw his book. The 
World Before Abraham, from further use in the 
School, and so take 'proper action' ; but the book as 
a whole was not objectionable; 'some statements' 
only were under criticism. Moreover, it was found 
by the committee that the book was only used for 
about twelve lessons each year during a brief dis- 
cussion of Pentateuchal questions. To withdraw 
his book would have been a weak acknowledgment 
that his teaching hitherto in this field of interpreta- 
tion had been mischievous. 

Third, by a slow process of correspondence it 
might have been possible to elicit from the Bishops 
a statement of the exact passages in Dr. Mitchell's 
book found 'objectionable and unwarranted.' If 
such quotations could have been obtained these 
specific parts of the book might have been brought 
to the attention of Dr. Mitchell by the committee, 
and a restatement of such passages urged upon 
him; but the official report of the Bishops gave no 
quotations; the resident Bishop had not thrown 
light upon the objectionable passages when he pre- 
sented the case to the Trustees. Therefore the 
committee supposed that such specific items could 
not be obtained. 

Fourth, the only other alternative left for the 
committee to pursue in taking 'proper action' 
was to proceed as it did. A long conference 



246 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

was held with Dr. Mitchell. He was given 
every chance to define his position in regard to the 
essential doctrines of the Church, in reference to 
Pentateuchal questions, and in respect to his rela- 
tion to modern exegetical scholarship. After a 
conference of several hours the committee could 
not discover that he was unsound in his belief in 
fundamental doctrines, nor that he is a represent- 
ative of extreme views among biblical scholars of 
the age, but rather is a representative of middle 
and safe ground as an Old Testament exegete. 

Wide-reaching investigation was made among 
the graduates of the School of Theology in regard 
to Dr. Mitchell's teaching and its effect upon their 
thought and their work in the ministry. The more 
general such inquiry, and the more numerous the 
testimonials, the clearer it became to the committee 
that Dr. Mitchell had been an effective, devoted and 
inspiring teacher — confirming and not undermin- 
ing the faith of the wavering, holding, by patient 
personal work, those who otherwise might have 
gone out into vagrancy in theology, and giving 
them secure foundations for an intelligent and vital 
faith. 

It was thought by the committee that the mem- 
bers of his own Faculty who had known him in- 
timately for many years should be allowed to add 
their testimony in this investigation that the com- 
mittee was prosecuting. The honored ex-Presi- 
dent of the University, now Dean of the School of 
Theology, who knew Dr. Mitchell's work in the 
University from its beginning, who had been coun- 
sellor and administrator of affairs at former crises 
in Dr. Mitchell's career, was asked to lead the 
Faculty in making up their contribution to the case 
of their colleague. In his most careful and pains- 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 247 

taking way Dr. Warren drew up a paper that was 
submitted to the Facultj^ revised and re-revised 
by it with minutest attention to every statement 
and phrase of the testimonial. ... It was this 
testimonial that was presented, with scarcely any 
change, to the Board of Bishops by the three del- 
egates from the Trustees, who were granted a hear- 
ing October 27 in Washington, 

"The Committee of eight finished its work Octo- 
ber 21 by submitting the following report at a 
special meeting of the Trustees held on that date : 

'Your Committee have carefully considered the 
matter referred to us, and unanimously recom- 
mend to the Trustees the adoption of the following 
preamble and resolutions ; to wit : 

Whereas we have carefully considered the action 
taken by the Board of Bishops last May concern- 
ing Professor Hinckley G. Mitchell and commimi- 
cated to us by its commissioner. Bishop Daniel A. 
Goodsell; and 

Whereas, after such consideration we are firmly 
persuaded that Professor Mitchell holds the essen- 
tial doctrines of Methodism, maintains a commend- 
able attitude towards the truth, is himself a devout 
Christian believer, and as an eminent scholar is pe- 
culiarly fitted to continue in the chair he has so 
successfully held for twenty years ; therefore 

Resolved, First, that we, the Trustees of Boston 
University, hereby respectfully renew our request 
to the Board of Bishops, that the reappointment 
by us of Dr. Hinckley G. Mitchell as Professor of 
Hebrew and Old Testament Exegesis for the five 
years dating from Conmiencement Day, 1905, may 
be confirmed. 



248 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Resolved, Second, that we earnestly hope favor- 
able action may be taken by the Board of Bishops 
at its meeting the present month, inasmuch as all 
courses of instruction in Old Testament subjects in 
the School of Theology are, and from the begin- 
ning of the year have been, suspended. 

Resolved, Third, that for the fuller presentation 
of our request to the Board of Bishops we hereby 
appoint a Committee of three; namely: William 
E. Huntington, President of the University, Wil- 
lard T. Perrin, Secretary of the Board of Trustees, 
and William F. Warren, Dean of the Faculty of 
the School of Theology. 

Resolved, Fourth, that we hereby respectfully 
invite Bishop Daniel A. Goodsell to bear, as our 
commissioner, the foregoing action to the Board 
of Bishops, and we request him to use his good 
offices to secure for our Committee a favorable 
hearing." 

The above is little more than an outline of the 
work done by the Trustees to secure my confirma- 
tion, it certainly justifies the claim with which 
President Huntington closes his statement: 

"The Trustees of the University have acted 
throughout this trying case with utmost loyalty 
to the Church, with unceasing deference to the epis- 
copal authorities, and in perfect consistency from 
the beginning to the end. They have stood almost 
unanimously in defense of a faithful teacher, for 
proper academic freedom in theological teaching, 
and for such ideals in ministerial education as are 
respected in the high places of Christian learning." 

It remains to present the reply of the Bishops, 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 249 

acting as a body, although only a bare majority of 
them were opposed to my confirmation, to the above 
petition. It read as follows: 

"Washington, October 31, 1905. 

With reference to any action taken by the Bish- 
ops in the case of any candidate for confirmation 
as teacher in any of our theological seminaries, it 
should be understood by all concerned that such 
action proceeds under the following directions of 
the General Conference of 1900 and 1904. 

1900. 

'Whereas, the charters and statutes of our theo- 
ogical schools differ widely from each other in the 
conditions precedent to the election and re-elec- 
tion of professors, it is evident no uniform require- 
ment can be imposed by the General Conference 
upon the institutions in the matter of elections. 
We recommend, however, as a condition of recog- 
nition of a theological school as a school of the 
Methodist Episcopal Church, that the General Con- 
ference require that its professors shall be confirmed 
by a majority vote of the Bishops present and vot- 
ing at any regular meeting of their board. We 
further recommend that, in case of a re-election, if 
a majority of the Bishops present and voting at 
any regular meeting of the board fails to concur, 
the Bishops shall state fully and in writing the 
grounds of non-concurrence both to the professor 
concerned and to the trustees of the theological 
school. 

1904. 

1. The General Conference has declared the the- 
ological schools to exist for the entire Church, and 



250 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

the schools themselves have by charter or otherwise 
given the Bishops the right to nominate or confirm 
the election of professors in the various depart- 
ments, which right the Bishops have repeatedly 
exercised. 

2. We therefore again commit the theological 
seminaries of the Church to the careful supervision 
of the Board of Bishops, to the end that the Church 
may be protected from erroneous teachings and the 
schools from unwarranted assault. 

3. The Bishops are hereby counseled not to nom- 
inate or confirm any professor in our theological 
schools concerning whose agreement with our doc- 
trinal standards they have a reasonable doubt. 

4. The Bishops are hereby authorized and di- 
rected, whenever specific charges of misteaching 
in any of our theological schools are made in writ- 
ing by responsible parties, members or ministers of 
our Church, to appoint a committee of their own 
number to investigate such charges, whose report, 
if adopted by the Bishops, shall be transmitted to 
the Trustees of the theological school involved for 
proper action in the premises. 

5. We urge that Bishops diligently strive to al- 
lay all undue irritation upon this subject, and 
'maintain and set forward quietness, love, and peace 
among all men.' 

We admonish all instructors in our schools to 
studiously avoid, as far as possible, all occasion of 
misunderstanding of their doctrinal attitude both in 
their oral teaching and in their publications, and 
that they counsel their pupils to carefully avoid 
statements which would disturb the faith of those to 
whom they minister. 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 251 

We deprecate the dissemination of distrust in 
the Church by indiscriminate and indefinite attacks 
upon religious teachers and theological institutions. 
The Discipline of our Church provides ample tests 
for determining the doctrinal soundness of preach- 
ers and teachers. All charges of erroneous teach- 
ing should be presented to the proper tribunal, 
where they can be legally tried and where the rights 
of both the accuser and the accused are fully pro- 
tected by constitutional safeguards. 

We find nothing in either of these deliverances 
to suggest that any candidate or nominee whose con- 
firmation is contested, shall be put upon trial before 
the Bishop. The investigation ordered by the 
General Conference in such a case is not, and, in 
the nature of the case, cannot be, a disciplinary 
trial. On the contrary, the last sentence of the 
action of 1904 distinctly recognizes the constitu- 
tional right of such accused teacher to a trial by 
the method, and before the tribunal, prescribed in 
the book of Discipline. 

It would therefore be improper for the Bishops 
to so conduct their inquiries under this legislation 
as to seem to encroach upon the province of the 
Annual Conference. 

Furthermore, we realize that the prerogative con- 
ferred upon the Bishops by the law above quoted 
is one of great delicacy, and should therefore be 
exercised only within the safest possible limitation, 
in order to avoid embarrassing legal complications. 
Hence in our previous action in the case of Pro- 
fessor H. G. Mitchell we were careful not to go 
beyond what was absolutely required by the order 
of the General Conference (above referred to). 

After careful deliberation, we sent to the Board 



252 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

of Tmstees which had elected Professor Mitchell a 
courteous statement of the reasons why we felt con- 
strained to return his name without formal action, 
being careful to convey in the most delicate way at 
our command our conclusion in regard to the 
charges that had been filed with us against his 
teaching, in order that 'proper action in the prem- 
ises' might be taken. Having, at our present ses- 
sion, heard a statement of the process adopted by 
said Trustees and of their reasons for returning 
the nomination of Professor Mitchell, again asking 
our confirmation of his election, which statement 
was made by an authorized committee of the Trus- 
tees, we are now compelled to say : 

That our action of six months ago was equiva- 
lent to a refusal to confirm the election of Profes- 
sor Mitchell, and that we have no reason to alter 
the conclusion then reached, which was based upon 
the conviction that 'some of the statements (con- 
tained in his book) concerning the historic charac- 
ter of the book of Genesis seem to be unwarranted 
and objectionable as having a tendency to invali- 
date the authority of other portions of the Scrip- 
tures.' It is furthermore our opinion that we are 
not even at liberty to reopen the question of Pro- 
fessor Mitchell's confirmation imder the law above 
cited. Unanimously adopted. 

By order and on behalf of the Bishops, 

John M. Walden, Secretary. 

I was in Washington when this action was taken, 
having gone thither at the suggestion of one of 
the Bishops, that I might be within call if my testi- 
mony on any important point was needed. The 
report of what had been done came to me that eve- 



"TELL IT NOT IN GATH!" 253 

ning by telephone in four words: "Sorry; but 
we've failed"; and this brief message dispelled any 
hope I had cherished that I might be of further 
service as a teacher to the Methodist Church; but 
my faith in God and his truth was imshaken. 



A TEACHER AT LARGE 

This was not the last of the Mitchell Case. The 
Bishops evidently intended that it should be. In 
fact they refused to discuss it further, when, some 
months after their second refusal to confirm me, 
I asked them which of my statements concerning 
the historical character of the early chapters of 
Genesis had offended them. The Editor of Zion's 
Herald thought it "well to have this disturbing, 
compromising matter come to an end." The Trus- 
tees, naturally impatient to see work in the depart- 
ment of the Old Testament resimied, accepted the 
decision of the Bishops and elected one of the ablest 
of our alumni to the place that I had occupied. 
Biit there is a proverb to the effect that "a thing 
is never settled until it is settled rightly," and 
this case proved no exception. However, since 
the proper end was slow in coming, and mean- 
while much of more than passing interest had hap- 
pened, I am going to devote this present chapter 
to this interval, which proved to be one of the most 
important periods of my life. 

In the first place I must record the generosity 
with which the Trustees helped me out of the em- 

254 



A TEACHER AT LARGE 255 

barrassing situation in which I was placed by the 
refusal of the Bishops to confirm me. In Sep- 
tember, when my Conference met, since I could 
not take for granted that I should be, I asked 
Bishop Spellmeyer to appoint me Instructor in 
the Semitic Languages in Boston University, a 
position I had for some time held, but for which 
I did not need episcopal approval. This appoint- 
ment, of course, was purely provisional, but, when 
the Bishops had taken their final action, the 
Trustees confirmed it and granted me leave of ab- 
sence for the year on half my former salary. This 
provision reUeved me from the necessity of im- 
mediately seeking a new position, but left me free 
to accept anything that offered. 

Here, again, I have to record an experience that 
fills me with wonder and gratitude whenever I 
recall it. Two or three days after the action of 
the Bishops I received a letter from President Hall 
of the Union Theological Seminary, with whom I 
had no acquaintance, in which he asked me to 
preach to his students in January on Faith and 
Biblical Criticism. I was naturally greatly sur- 
prised by this invitation, the more so because I 
seldom preached anywhere, and never with much 
confidence or satisfaction. My first impulse, there- 
fore, was to decline it with thanks for the sympathy 



256 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

it was evidently intended to convey; but I was in 
spch a frame of mind that I was finally moved to 
say to myself: "This looks as if God were with 
me. If He is, and I do my best, He'll see that I 
don't fail." I therefore wrote to Dr. Hall that I 
would come, and at once went to work on my ser- 
mon. And what a blessing the preparation of that 
sermon was! After twenty-five years of continu- 
ous teaching I had suddenly been deprived of the 
stimulus and encouragement which I had found 
in contact with young lives and threatened with in- 
definite inactivity and unhappiness. The subject 
suggested at once took possession of me, but for 
three or four weeks so many students, alimcmi, and 
other sympathizers called or wrote to me, that I 
could not give much thought to it or anything else, 
even to my meals. When, however, the time came 
I went to New York on an earnest defense of the 
critics as the friends, and not the enemies, of the 
Bible and religion. I do not now how effective 
it was ; I do not remember that any one said any- 
thing either complimentary or the contrary to me 
about it; but I remember that, as I was leaving the 
chapel, Bishop Andrews, whom I had seen in the 
congregation, stopped me and, as he shook my hand, 
whispered in my ear, "Have faith and patience"; 



A TEACHER AT LARGE 257 

and I took no further thought of my success or 
failure as a preacher. 

I have no reason to suppose that President Hall 
or any one else, when I was invited to New York, 
had in mind anything but a dignified pubhc ex- 
pression of sympathy; but a surprise was awaiting 
me. It came the next evening, when I was at a 
gathering of Presbyterian ministers, where it fell 
to me to sit beside Professor Briggs. In the course 
of our conversation he referred to the recent death 
of President Harper and remarked that, since Dr. 
Harper had written only one of the three volumes 
in the International Commentary assigned to him, 
he (Dr. Briggs) was obUged to find one or more 
others to take his place. He added that he had 
thought of me, but, as another Methodist had de- 
clined, explaining that no scholar of our Church 
could now safely take any share in such a project, he 
had supposed that it would be useless to approach 
me on the subject. Now, I had for a long time felt 
that I should like to try my hand on something more 
thoroughly critical than the books I had hitherto 
written, but I had been debarred for lack of time 
from so large an undertaking. I saw at once, of 
coin*se, that here was an opportunity for me to 
realize my ambition, and not having the fear of 



258 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

what man could do to me before my eyes, I said 
as calmly as I could, ''Try it." Thereupon he 
told me that he should be ^lad to have me take 
Haggai and Zechariah and write commentaries on 
these books in the general style of the International 
Series. Before we separated it was so agreed, and 
I, who but a few days before had been denied per- 
mission to teach my Methodist brothers, found my« 
self commissioned anew, and this time to a much 
wider world. 

I began my task as soon as I returned to Boston 
and spent upon it two delightful years. It took 
me so long because, having seen Dr. Harper's 
Amos and Hosea criticized as not so much an in- 
terpretation of these two books as a history of their 
interpretation, I, with Professor Briggs's approval,, 
undertook to produce a more independent work. 
To this end I first made a very careful translation 
of the Massoretic text of the books assigned me. 
Then I compared the great versions and corrected 
the original and my rendering by them where they 
seemed to have preserved a better reading, only 
a few times, where they failed me, resorting to 
conjecture. Next, taking the books in their order, 
I gave them as thorough exegetical treatment as 
I could and wrote a commentary, with the requi- 
site introductory studies and separate sections of 



A TEACHER AT LARGE 259 

critical notes. This I did almost without con- 
sulting even the recognized "authorities" on the 
same books, thus producing something which, w^hat- 
ever its exegetical value, had the merit of com- 
parative originality. I did not, however, intend 
to ignore my predecessors. When, therefore, I 
had thus put into writing the (as I thought) un- 
prejudiced results of my own studies, I took the 
commentaries on my prophets that were of any 
importance and went rapidly through them, noting 
their views and the reasons for them, especially 
where they conflicted with those that I had taken. 
In the hght of these notes I revised my comments, 
correcting them where I found myself clearly mis- 
taken, but maintaining my position in any case in 
which the dissenter failed to produce the better 
reasons. Finally I rewrote my entire manuscript 
as rapidly as possible, mending faulty connections, 
and those obscure or inadequate expressions which 
perplex and hinder the reader, wherever I de- 
tected them, and sent it to New York. I was 
naturally pleased when Professor Briggs informed 
me that I had been admitted to the goodly fel- 
lowship of contributors to the International, but 
it did not add to my gratification to reflect that, 
but for the groundless prejudice against bibhcal 
criticism by which it was blinded, the Methodist 



260 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Church might have been better represented. 
I enjoyed great inward peace during these two 
years, in spite of the fact that, after the first, I 
ceased to be connected with Boston University and 
the continuance of my studies meant temporary 
self-denial for me and mine. But the work I 
was doing seemed to both of us so important that 
we never thought of changing our course. When 
we came to the end of the second year it had been 
so abundant in blessing that I should have accused 
myself of ingratitude if I had found myself worry- 
ing about the future. I was not in the least anxious, 
but, about a week before I finished my commen- 
tary, I said, "I wonder what the good Lord wants 
me to do next." Well, within the week I re- 
ceived from Professor Mathews of the University 
of Chicago, to whom I was then a stranger, a 
letter in which he informed me that he was editing 
for Macmillan & Co. a series of popular common- 
taries to be called The Bible for Home and 
School, and that he wished me to write the vol- 
imie on Genesis. This offer was not, from the 
pecuniary point of view, very alluring, but, as it 
seemed providential, and as I had a good share of 
the material for the proposed volume in The 
World Before Abraham, I accepted it. It did 
not, of course, take me as long as my last book, 



A TEACHER AT LARGE 261 

but the work I did on it was just as conscientious 
and when, in about a year, it was done, I was pretty 
well satisfied with it. I have not liked it so well 
since it was published, because the publishers, 
against my advice, uselessly designated every word 
or phrase on which there was a comment by a°, 
thus increasing the number of references until the 
text, as I told them, looked like a speckled hen. 
They also, without my knowledge, added an index 
which was so inadequate that one of the reviewers 
of the book held it up to ridicule. 

I finished my Genesis in the spring of 1909. 
When it was done it seemed wise for us to take 
another vacation. We therefore arranged with 
some friends to go to Europe by the southern route 
and spend a month together in Italy. The voyage 
was delightful, the weather being perfect and our 
company well suited to one another. On landing 
we spent a few days in Naples and its vicinity, and 
a few more in Rome; after which we made a tour 
of the hill towns to the north, Braciano, Viterbo, 
Montefiascone, Orvieto, Spoleto, Assisi, Perugia. 
All these places were new to us and highly inter- 
esting for their sites, their historical associations, 
and their artistic treasures; especially the second 
and the last three. We spent only a fortnight — 
aU too brief a visit — among them, but we obtained 



262 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

a lastingly enjoyaible impression with reference to 
them and their peculiar attractions. 

After a few days at Florence we left our friends 
and pushed on to Germany, our first objective be- 
ing Munich, where we heard two performances at 
the musical festival then in progress, spending the 
five days between them on the Starnberger Sea. 

Our next stop was at the quaint little city of 
Diinkelsbiihl, a rival of Rothenburg, whence we 
went to Niirnberg, Naulieim, Eisenach, and finally 
Leipzig. Here we rested nearly a fortnight, 
meanwhile enjoying our friends and the musical 
advantages of the city. Then we went by way of 
Celle, the home of the Georges, to England. 

This was our last visit to Germany, and the least 
pleasant of all that we had ever made. It was not 
the Germany of the days of the old Kaiser. For 
twenty years we had seen materialism and milita- 
rism more and more completely mastering the 
national hfe until we could no longer feel at home 
among its people. This time, therefore, although 
we could not refuse our old friends the tribute of 
an auf wiedersehen, we were not sure that we 
wished ever to come again. Not that we dreamed 
of hostility between the two countries, for we 
thought we knew the Germans, and we should have 
scouted the idea that they, with their lack of genu- 



A TEACHER AT LARGE 263 

ine initiative, would ever attain a position from 
which they could hope to conquer the world. 

The time we had yet to spare was mainly spent 
in genealogical excursions. The first was to Kent 
in search of information concerning the Hinckleys, 
the American representative of our branch of that 
family having emigrated from Tenterden in that 
county. 

Next we went to Wales, to revisit the surviving 
members of the family, the Rowlandses, to which 
my maternal grandfather belonged, and, if pos- 
sible, to learn more about their early history. 

Finally, we took a trip to Ireland and spent two 
weeks in Dublin and Londonderry, searching the 
records of the latter city for traces of the hneage 
of Alexander Wilson, one of Mrs. Mitchell's an- 
cestors, who came to this coimtry after helping to 
defend it successfully in the siege of 1688. 

These researches were not very productive. I 
was not born to be a genealogist. I have no 
memory for names and dates, like a friend of mine 
who carries in his mind thousands of such items 
when he is at work. But it was interesting and in- 
structive to see the places from which our ancestors 
sprang, and sometimes the veiy houses in which 
some of them actually lived. It helped us to feel 
that we were really of their blood. 



264* POR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

I come now to the final stage in my experience 
as an alleged heretic. It is not so serious as those 
that preceded. Indeed, there are those, cynically- 
disposed, who will find an element of humor in it. 
*'The judicious," however, will not lack for things 
done or omitted over which to "grieve." 

It is a recognized fact that any one who happens 
to be the object of serious criticism is liable to be- 
come a mark for more or less unbalanced enthusi- 
asts. Sometimes the result is murder. I do not 
know that I was ever in danger from knife or bul- 
let, but I was shadowed, so to speak, for more than 
three years by a former student who three times 
brought formal charges, or attempted to, against 
me. He first approached me with cimning in the 
following letter: 

My dear Prof. Mitchell: 

It must be very unpleasant for you to have so 
much talk about heresy associated with your teach- 
ing. I should think you would demand an investi- 
gation by an impartial committee of your Confer- 
ence, so as to set the mind of the Church at rest on 
the subject. I have been wondering if you would 
not appreciate having a charge of heresy preferred 
against you, so the matter could be thoroughly 
sifted this fall. It is not fair to you to allow so 
much talk, if you are innocent. It is not fair to the 
Church to have you teaching young ministers, if 



A TEACHER AT LARGE 265 

you do teach falseness about the Bible and its doc- 
trines. 

Cordially, 



I paid no attention to his suggestion, but he 
preferred his charges ; not, however, to my Con- 
ference, but to the Bishops, at a meeting of the 
Board of Missions, in Boston, about the time that 
the delegation from Southern California presented 
theirs, namely, November, 1904. The Bishops 
seem to have ignored him. 

The next spring he introduced a resolution aimed 
at me, during the session of the New England Con- 
ference, of which he was then a member, but it was 
promptly defeated. 

Albout a year later, stung by his past failures, 
he became, not only aggressive, but abusive. The 
following is a copy of a letter dated June 3, 1906 : 

Prof. H. G. Mitchell, 

Dear Sir: Since I became convinced of your 
real character I have taken no pains to conceal my 
opinion, as you very well know. Believing, as I 
do, that you are thoroughly corrupt, I cannot be 
satisfied that I have done my duty until you are 
outside of the Methodist fold. 

If 3^ou care to withdraw quietly, without a trial 
and without charges being formally preferred, you 
can do so, if you act within the next few days. 



266 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Unless I am satisfied by you or your Presiding El- 
der that you have withdrawn from the ministry 
and membership of the M. E. Church within the 
next thirty days, I shall take it that you prefer to 
contest the matter in a trial. As near as I can 
learn you have spared no pains to wreck our Church 
for the past twenty years. If you had your just 
deserts you [would] be behind prison bars for the 
rest of your natural life. But the Church has no 
power to punish beyond expulsion. A man who 
will lie and deceive the Church, and browbeat the- 
ological students, as you have done, for the past 
twenty years, is as wicked as a man can possibly be. 
If you prefer a trial to a quiet withdrawal I will 
spare no pains to get you lawfully expelled. I 
have no personal enmity against you, but I cannot 
endure a fraud. 



There was so evident a breach of Discipline in 
this letter that I sent it to his Presiding Elder and 
demanded that he call the brother to account. He 
did, and my correspondent became a little more 
guarded in his language, but persisted in his de- 
termination to drive me from the Church ; and in the 
fall he was on hand at my Conference, the Central 
'New York, with his charges. 

Fortunately, the Bishop (Fowler), although 
be had no sympathy with my ideas and had voted 
against my confirmation, was perfectly fair in his 
rulings, and the committee he appointed in its ex- 
amination. I was especially fortunate in having 



A TEACHER AT LARGE 267 

the loyal and enthusiastic assistance of Dr., now 
Bishop, McConnell, whom President Huntington 
and other friends had sent to defend me. The 
Rev. Dr. Daniel Steele contributed a paper on 
The Kenosis and the Higher Critics, 

The Committee reported that the charges did 
not contain "sufficient ground to warrant the Con- 
ference in proceeding to a trial of the case, but, 
when it was moved that my character be passed, 
the Conference, after some debate, asked the 
Bishop to appoint a Committee to investigate my 
case and take whatever action they might think 
wise. They then thoughtlessly gave me a super- 
numerary relation, thus, as I afterward discovered, 
rendering any action by the Committee contrary 
to the Discipline, which says that "a supernum- 
erary" "residing without the bounds of his own 
conference shall be subject," "under the authority 
of the P^residing Elder within whose district he 
resides, to the investigation prescribed." 

The Committee, evidently unacquainted with 
the rule I have quoted, held their first meeting in 
December. I was notified of the meeting, but al- 
lowed to send a paper in lieu of attending. I did 
not hear anything further until September 1907, 
when I received a copy of the report it was pro- 
posed to present to the Conference at its coming 



268 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

session. It is so remarkable an example of what 
it should not have been that it is worth quoting 
entire : 

*'Dear Fathers and Brethren : Your Committee 
appointed at the session of 1906, to consider the 
case of Hinckley G. Mitchell, respectfully report 
that, after careful and thorough study of Dr. 
Mitchell's writings and teachings we believe that 
he is not in harmony with the doctrines [and] Disci- 
pline of the Methodist Episcopal Church. It is 
moreover our judgment that he failed to keep the 
covenant made with the Church, the Conference, 
and the School of Theology of Boston University. 

We therefore endorse the action of the Board of 
Bishops in declining to confirm him as professor 
in said School. Nevertheless, in view of the fact 
that he no longer holds a professorship, and in view 
of the great disturbance that a church trial would 
occasion, we recommend : That the Conference do 
not proceed to the extremity of a trial as yet; but 
that it make a deliverance, protesting against un- 
Methodistic, destructive, and divisive teachings in 
any of our theological schools." 

The Conference met on the second of October 
under the presidency of Bishop Berry, — again one 
of those who opposed my confirmation. Dr. 
McConnell was again my counsel and, as such, 
was granted permission to represent me. 

On the following day, in executive session, the 
Committee presented its report, with the omission 
of the last sentence of the second paragraph. Dr. 



A TEACHER AT LARGE 269 

McConnell being recognized, protested against the 
adoption of the recommendations of the Committee 
as unreasonable and unjust. Several amendments 
were proposed and rejected. I suggested pri- 
vately that I would not object to such a charge as 
"holds views on which there is considerable differ- 
ence of opinion and widespread anxiety in our 
Church." I was wilHng that the Conference 
should give expression to their conservative spirit 
and attitude, if they would consent to show me like 
tolerance. Apparently neither Dr. McConnell 
nor I made as much as we might have made of the 
point that the Committee was improperly consti- 
tuted and that therefore the report was entirely 
out of order. 

The Conference, after various attempts to amend 
the report, adopted it without change, except for 
the elision of the phrase "as yet" in the last para- 
graph. Then, strange as it may seem, they passed 
my character, that is, virtually declared me inno- 
cent of the charges made ; upon which Dr. McCon- 
nell, speaking for me, demanded an immediate 
trial. An attempt was made to meet this demand, 
but it was found impossible to secure a committee 
to frame the charges. When it was moved that 
the one which had made the report serve in this 
capacity, four of its members, "with one accord," 



270 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

declined. The vote to grant an inunediate trial 
was finally reconsidered, my relation charged from 
supernumerary to effective, and action on my de- 
mand deferred until the session of 1908. I gave 
notice that I reserved the right to file objections 
against the legahty of the entire proceedings in 
my case with the proper tribunal. I ought to add 
that the original complainant was present at the 
Conference, with new charges, but he was not al- 
lowed to present them or have any least part in the 
proceedings. 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 

When I gave notice of an intention to file ob- 
jections to the proceedings in my case at the Cen- 
tral New York Conference, I of course had in 
mind an appeal to the General Conference; which 
was due to meet in the following May. When the 
time came I went to Baltimore with the following 
paper : 

"Hinckley G. Mitchell, a member of the Central 
New York Conference, makes complaint to the 
General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church held in Baltimore, Ma}^ 1908, as follows: 

1. That, at the Session of the Central New York 
Conference held at Penn Yan, New York, October 
1906, a committee was appointed by order of the 
Conference to determine whether it was necessary 
to bring charges against the said Hinckley G. 
Mitchell for heresy; that after the said committee 
had been appointed the relation of Hinckley G. 
Mitchell was changed from effective to supernu- 
merary, without making provision for having the 
investigation conducted according to paragraph 
222, section 4, of the Discipline. 

2. That, though the action appointing the com- 
mittee became null and void with the change of 
Hinckley G. Mitchell from effective to supernumer- 



272 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

ary, the said committee proceeded to investigate the 
doctrinal soundness of the complainant. 

3. That, in carrying on this alleged investiga- 
tion, the committee did not summon Hinckley G. 
Mitchell or his representative to appear before 
them. 

4. That this conmiittee, in reporting to the Con- 
ference at the session held at Auburn in October, 
1907, did not confine itself to a simple statement 
as to whether Hinckley G. Mitchell was, or was 
not, deserving of having charges brought against 
him, but declared Hinckley G. Mitchell guilty of 
heresy, without giving specifications or presenting 
any evidence, as required by the Discipline, when 
a member is arraigned before a conference, as your 
complainant virtually was, although the conmiittee 
reported against trying him. The following are the 
words of the report: 'Your committee appointed 
at the session of 1906 to consider the case of Hinck- 
ley G. Mitchell, respectfully report, that, after 
careful and thorough study of Dr. Mitchell's writ- 
ings and teachings, we believe that he is not in har- 
mony with the Doctrines and Discipline of the 
Methodist Church.' 

5. That the Conference proceeded to adopt the 
report of the committee after it was protested by 
the representative of Hinckley G. Mitchell that 
the committee had no disciplinary standing, and 
that the report reflected upon the character of a 
Methodist minister who had not been tried and 
found guilty. 

6. That, upon the request of said Hinckley G. 
Mitchell for immediate trial upon the statements 
made in the report, the Conference passed the char- 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 273 

acter of Hinckley G. Mitchell, while at the same 
time refusing to reconsider the adoption of the re- 
port. Hinckley G. Mitchell protests that this ac- 
tion was equivalent to denying him a trial after 
charges had been brought against him by the Con- 
ference. 

7. That, upon repeated demand of Hinckley G. 
Mitchell for immediate trial, the Conference post- 
poned action on his request for one year. Hinckley 
G. Mitchell protests that this action was equiva- 
lent to denying him a trial after charges had been 
made against him by the Conference. 

8. That the proceedings of the Conference were 
presided over by a Bishop who had already passed 
upon charges brought against Hinckley G. Mitch- 
ell, in that the Bishop had agreed to a statement 
of the Board of Bishops, unanimously adopted, that 
'some of the statements (of Professor Mitchell) 
concerning the historic character of the early chap- 
ters of the book of Genesis seem to be unwarranted 
and objectionable, and as having a tendency to in- 
vahdate the authority of other portions of the 
Scriptures' (Dated October 31, 1905) ; that, while 
the said presiding Bishop, so far as the complain- 
ant knows, did not intentionally exert unfair in- 
fluence against Hinckley G, Mitchell, the very fact 
that the presiding Bishop and the Board of Bishops 
had already passed adversely upon the doctrinal 
soundness of Hinckley G. Mitchell was prejudicial 
to the case of Hinckley G. Mitchell. 

Your complainant respectfully requests, in view 
of these facts, that the action of the so-called com- 
mittee in the case of Hinckley G. Mitchell, and the 
action of the Conference in adopting the report of 
the committee be declared null and void. 



274 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

These objections are filed in accordance with a 
notice given the Central ISTew York Conference, 
Friday, October 4, 1907 (Minutes, p. 48). 

( Signed) Hinckley G. Mitchell." 

This complaint — which, as I copy it, sounds un- 
necessarily repetitious in its identification of the 
party of the first part — ^was duly laid before the 
General Conference and referred to the Committee 
on Judiciary. The case was so clear that this 
Committee had no difficulty in reaching a decision 
adverse to the Conference, but a minority preferred 
a milder form of verdict. The Majority report, 
as published in the Advocate, read as follows : 

"Your Committee on Judiciary, having care- 
fully reviewed the records on appeal in the case of 
Hinckley G. Mitchell, of the Central New York 
Conference, report as follows, to wit: 

It appears by the records that in October, 1906, 
a committee was appointed by the order of said 
conference to investigate the case of Hinckley G. 
Mitchell and to take whatever action they might 
deem wise. 

After said committee was appointed the relation 
of said Hinckley G. Mitchell was changed from 
effective to supernumerary, without making pro- 
vision to have the investigation conducted accord- 
ing to paragraph 222, section 4, of the Discipline. 

The committee proceeded to investigate the doc- 
trinal soundness of said Hinckley G. Mitchell, but 
did not summon or notify him or his representatives 
to appear before it. The committee, in reporting 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 275 

to the Conference at the session held in October, 
1907, without giving specifications or presenting 
any evidence, reported that they believed that the 
said Hinckley G. Mitchell was not in harmony with 
the doctrine and Discipline of the Methodist Epis- 
copal Church, and at the same time recommended 
that the Conference do not proceed to the extrem- 
ity of a trial, but that it make a deliverance pro- 
testing against un-Methodistic, destructive and 
divisive teachings in any of our theological schools. 

The report of the committee was adopted by the 
Conference and thereafter the Conference passed 
the character of said Hinckley G. Mitchell, but re- 
fused to reconsider the adoption of the report of 
the committee. 

Demand was thereupon made by said Hinckley 
G. Mitchell for immediate trial, but the Conference 
deferred action upon his demand for one year. A 
motion to expunge from the report of the commit- 
tee all reflection upon the character of said Hinckley 
G. Mitchell was laid upon the table. 

There appears to be no disciplinary provision for 
the report of the committee or the action of the 
Conference in adopting such report. The report 
of the committee was a reflection upon the charac- 
ter of said Hinckley G. Mitchell. It was the duty 
of the Conference to grant him a trial upon his de- 
mand therefore, or to expunge from the report of 
the committee all reflection upon his character. 
The Conference neglected and refused so to do. 
Your Committee on Judiciary therefore recom- 
mend that the action of the committee appointed 
by the Central New York Conference to investi- 
gate the case of the said Hinckley G. Mitchell, and 
the action of the Conference in adopting the report 
of such committee be declared null and void." 



276 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

This report was signed by the Chairman and 
Secretary of the Committee on Judiciary. The 
Minority Report, signed by two members, differed 
from it only in that it recommended that "the action 
of the Central New York Conference in refusing 
to grant the said Hinckley G. Mitchell a trial is 
disapproved." 

One speech was made in favor of the reports, 
then the Chairman of the Conmiittee on Judiciary, 
Dean Rogers, of Yale, closed the discussion with 
these words: "I have but a few words to say on this 
question. Now what is the question? I submit 
to the lawyers in this body, whether in the civil 
courts of the land a man can be charged with an 
offence and that charge be permitted to hang over 
his head and he denied the right to a trial on it. 
You must try him or you must dismiss your charge. 
Now the question here is whether this ecclesiastical 
court will permit an Annual Conference through 
the report of an investigating committee to practi- 
cally charge a man with heresy and, when asked 
to be tried on the charge, tell him that he shall 
have no trial, and yet continue the charge hanging 
over his head. The majority of the Judiciary say 
that that is rank injustice, which the civil courts 
will not permit, and the question is whether you 
will adopt the same rule or whether you will permit 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 277 

the conference to take this action, spread it on its 
records, leave it unexpunged, and say to the man, 
'You have been so charged with heresy. We will 
not give you a trial to enable you to show whether 
you are guilty or innocent.' I move the adoption 
of the report of the majority." 

It was adopted, and I, of course, was gratified 
with the result, although I could not but regret 
that it had to be gained by the humiliation of my 
Conference. I realized, too, that the Conference 
would probably wish to settle it at the next session. 
A motion that a Committee be appointed to frame 
charges was actually made; but it was lost, and 
my case was then referred to one of the Presiding 
Elders. In 1909, however, while I was in Europe, 
it was proposed, I believe, to try me in my absence. 
To prevent so evident an injustice the Bishop 
(Hamilton) transferred me temporarily to the 
New Hampshire, and later, by all but (two) unani- 
mous requests of this latter, to the New England 
Conference; the one to which I ought long before 
to have been transferred, and the one to which, if 
I had been transferred, I presume, the soundness of 
my theological views would never have been seri- 
ously questioned, or, if they had been, I should have 
been promptly and thoroughly vindicated. 

I did not expect the same kind or degree of 
success from my complaint against the Bishops 



278 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

as against my Conference. I did not aim to secure 
a reversal of their action. I had severed my con- 
nection with the School of Theology and my suc- 
cessor had been elected and installed. Moreover, 
I was engaged in work which, at least for the time 
being, was more to my liking than teaching. I 
felt, however, that the Bishops had transcended 
their legitimate authority and that the matter ought 
to be investigated, so that, if this view was correct, 
they might, by the amendment of the law under 
which they claimed to have acted, or express and 
unmistakable restrictions, be prevented from re- 
peating so serious a mistake. "A consummation 
devoutly to be wished." Therefore, as the date 
of the General Conference of 1908 drew near I 
prepared a complaint to that body and sent a 
notice of my intention, with a copy of the com- 
plaint, to the Board of Bishops. Before present- 
ing it in as abridged a form as possible, I ought 
to explain that, although a minority of the Bishops 
favored my confirmation and labored earnestly to 
the last to secure it, since, for some reason these 
friends finally merged their individualities in a 
unanimous pronouncement, I had to include them 
formally in any reference to the action which re- 
sulted in my removal from my position. I protest, 
however, while I do so, not only that I bear them 
no ill, but that I recall with heartfelt gratitude 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 279 

their efforts through a series of years in my behalf. 
My complaint consisted, in the first place, of a 
recital of the history of the refusal of the Bishops 
to act on my confirmation. I quoted from the 
action of the General Conference of 1904 the three 
paragraphs two, (c) and (d) and four, under which 
the Bishops acted, and from that of 1900 the re- 
quirement that, in the case of a re-election "the 
Bishops shall state fully and in writing the grounds 
of nonconcurrence, both to the professor concerned 
and to the Trustees of the theological school," I 
then said: 

"I complain that, in the action taken by the 
Board of Bishops as set forth in their reports of 
May 1 and October 31, 1905, to the Trustees of 
Boston University, and their reply dated May 8, 
1906, to a protest from me, dated May 1, 1906, 
they violated the Discipline and my rights as a 
minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and 
ignored or misinterpreted the instructions of the 
General Conference." 

I then mentioned the presentation of charges 
against me by H. W. Peck et at; the reference of 
the same to a Committee of Bishops: the report of 
this Committee and the action thereon of the Board 
of Bishops, and the report of the Board to the 
Trustees of the University. 

I next gave a resume of the attempt of the Trus- 
tees to meet the requirement of "proper action in 



280 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

the premises" and introduced the second report of 
the Board of Bishops, refusing to reconsider their 
previous decision. 

Finally, I added my appeal to the Bishops for 
specifications, etc., and their reply to it. 

The complaint proper I reproduce verbatim: 

"This concludes the history of my case, as far 
as the direct action of the Board of Bishops is con- 
cerned. There is, however, one more point that 
must be mentioned in this connection, to make clear 
the extent of the injustice done me. I refer to 
the disadvantage under which I have since labored 
in defending myself in my own Conference, where 
I have twice since been accused of heresy. On 
each of these occasions my accusers cited the ac- 
tion of the Bishops to my disadvantage, and on 
each of them the presiding Bishop, because he was 
known to have opposed my confirmation, was a 
silent witness against me. At the last session, as 
I shall show in another connection, the prejudice 
thus created was so strong that it was impossible 
for me to secure disciplinary treatment. 

Having thus laid before your reverend and hon- 
orable body the salient facts with reference to the 
action of the Board of Bishops, in the matter of my 
confirmation, as I have gathered them, I beg leave 
to prefer the following requests: 

1. That you will take these facts, and any others 
that may be elicited by investigation, and record 
your judgment, as representative of the Metho- 
dist Episcopal Church on the following points: 

a. Whether the General Conference of 1904, in 
the action cited by the Board of Bishops, did, or 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 281 

did not, authorize them to entertain formal charges 
against teachers in the theological schools and pass 
upon such charges, as the Bishops actually did 
when they pronounced the evidence produced 
against me by H. W. Peck and others not suffi- 
cient to prove the first complaint. 

b. Whether in either case the Bishops, by con- 
sidering these charges and rendering that decision, 
did, or did not, usurp and illegally exercise, a func- 
tion of the Annual Conference, to which, according 
to the Discipline, and the evident intent of the 
General Conference of 1904, belongs the preroga- 
tive of 'determining the doctrinal soundness of 
preachers and teachers.' 

c. Whether in any case the Bishops, in render- 
ing the decision cited, did, or did not, one and all 
disqualify themselves for presiding at the Central 
New York Conference, when practically the same 
charges were preferred against me. 

d. Whether, on the supposition that the General 
Conference authorized, and legally, the Board of 
Bishops to entertain the charges lodged with them, 
the Committee, consisting in part of retired Bish- 
ops, however worthy, by whom the charges were in- 
vestigated, was, or was not, properly constituted. 

e. Whether, on the same supposition, the Com- 
mittee did, or did not, violate my rights as an ac- 
cused person, in omitting to call me before them, 
or furnish me with a copy of the charges, or even 
notify me that charges had been preferred against 
me. 

f. Whether, in any case, the Board of Bishops 
did, or did not, satisfy the requirements of the law 
of 1900, heretofore cited, in publishing in the de- 
nominational and other journals the statement that 



282 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

'some of the statements of Professor Mitchell con- 
cerning the historical character of the early chap- 
ters of Genesis' seemed to them 'unwarranted and 
objectionable and as having a tendency to invali- 
date the authority of other portions of the Scrip- 
tures,' and refusing my request for specifications. 
2. That if, in your judgment, the laws under 
which the Bishops claim to have acted are at fault, 
or their interpretation of these laws mistaken, or 
the mode of procedure adopted by them in any 
respect unjustifiable, you will so declare, and, in 
either or all, of these cases, determine the nature 
and measure of redress to which, as a minister of 
the Methodist Episcopal Church and a member of 
an annual conference, I am entitled. 

Respectfully submitted. 
May 6, 1908 ( Signed) Hinckley G. Mitchell." 

I forwarded my complaint to the General Con- 
ference by one of the delegates from the New Eng- 
land Conference and afterward myself went to Bal- 
timore, prepared, if invited, to go before the Com- 
mittee to which it had been referred. Dr. Mc- 
Connell, also, was present. 

My paper went first, we heard, to the Committee 
on Education, but it was finally sent to the Com- 
mittee on Judiciary, by which Dr. McConnell was 
granted a hearing and from which a report (18) 
in due time appeared in the Advocate ; an amazing 
report, in that, although it discussed my complaint 
point by point through the six under the first head, 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 283 

in each case sustained the Bishops and entirely ig- 
nored my second and most important request, one 
for a ruling on the law under which the Bishops 
claimed to have acted. We could not understand 
how a committee headed by the Dean of the Yale 
Law School could produce such a paper. I never 
understood the matter until Dean Rogers himself, 
some time after the Conference, very kindly ex- 
plained it. It appears that, when this report was 
published, the Committee, to which the Bishops also 
had appealed for a ruling on the law of 1904, was 
divided on the question of its constitutionality, but, 
when my complaint against my Conference had 
been received and considered, some of those who 
had contended for it changed their minds and the 
sentiment of the Committee. Meanwhile the Com- 
mittee on Education, which had been studying the 
same subject presented its report (4) as follows: 

"Your Committee, having carefully considered 
certain memorials referred to it relating to the 
supervising power of the Board of Bishops over 
our theological schools, begs leave to report as 
follows : 

Whereas, The Bishops in their Episcopal Ad- 
dress state that the action of the General Confer- 
ence of 1904 touching this matter involves certain 
inconsistencies and has proved in practice ^difficult 
to administer', and 

Whereas, The General Conference of 1856 re- 
quested the Bishops to act as advisers of the trus- 
tees of one of our theological schools, and 



284 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Whereas, The Board of Bishops, in pursuance 
of such request, advised the trustees to submit the 
election of each of its professors to the Board of 
Bishops for confirmation, and 

Whereas, As a condition precedent to confirm- 
ation and appointed in the Annual Conference, 
the Board of Bishops has required of each pro- 
fessor in all our theological schools a written pledge 
of loyalty to our doctrine and polity, and 

Whereas, This pecuhar advisory relationship of 
Board of Bishops has been recognized by the 
governing boards of all our theological schools, the 
Bishops either nominating or confirming their pro- 
fessors: therefore 

Resolved, That the General Conference hereby 
authorizes and directs that, whenever specific com- 
plaints are made in writing and signed by five re- 
sponsible persons, members or ministers of the 
Methodist Episcopal Church, charging a professor 
in one of our theological schools with violating 
his pledge to the Bishops of loyalty to our doctrine 
and polity, said charges shall be lodged with the 
Board of Bishops, who shall carefully consider the 
same, and, if in their opinion they are of sufficient 
gravitj^ to require an investigation, they shall im- 
mediately present them to the Presiding Elder of 
the Annual Conference to which the accused be- 
longs, where he shall be dealt with according to the 
provisions of the Discipline in paragraph 226. If 
however, he is a layman, the charges shall be sent to 
the pastor of the church of which he is a member 
and he shall be brought to trial according to the 
provision of paragraph 250 of the Discipline. 
But in case the complaints affect the manner of 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 285 

teaching, or the personal fitness of the professor 
for his office, and not his doctrinal soundness, the 
Bishops shall, after due consideration of the same, 
advise the governing board of the school in which 
he is a teacher of the action they have taken and 
their judgment in the case." 

The report was no sooner read than a member 
was on his feet to amend by substituting "the Pre- 
siding Elder" for "the Board of Bishops." This, 
however, did not satisfy Dean Bogers, who came 
forward with a more sweeping proposal. He in- 
troduced it as follows: 

"Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I had a report 
from the Committee on Judiciary on this question. 
I cannot at this particular stage of the proceedings 
introduce it as a report of the Judiciary Committee, 
but I desire to have a substitute, and, if you will 
permit me, I will read this as my speech before I 
make the substitute. 

The majority of the Committee on Judiciary are 
convinced that the legislation which imposes upon 
the Bishops the duty to investigate charges of her- 
esy is unconstitutional, inasmuch as it imposes upon 
the Bishops the duty to investigate the charges, 
and it makes them, first, the investigators, and 
afterwards, the presiding judge in the Conference, 
when the man is on trial. 

I am not going to enlarge on the constitutional 
question, but, as I have said, the majority of the 
Committee are convinced that legislation is un- 
constitutional, and we are all convinced, whether 



286 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

it is unconstitutional or not, that it is exceedingly 
inexpedient to do it; and I desire to move this 
resolution as a substitute: 

'Resolved, That the Bishops be, and hereby are, 
relieved from the duty of investigating and report- 
ing to the Board of Trustees upon charges of mis- 
teaching in our theological schools, but that, when 
charges of that nature are made, to, or laid before, 
these aforesaid Bishops, they may, without action 
thereon, refer the same to the Annual Conference 
of which the accused is a member, for such proceed- 
ing as such conference may deem appropriate in 
the premises.' 

I move that as a substitute for what is now before 
you." 

Several others spoke, among them W. H. 
Wilder, who concluded his remarks with — 

"Every minister has a right, not only to a trial, 
but a fair trial. Can it be a fair trial when the 
Bishops themselves are made the accusers in the 
case? And then they are the judges of the law, 
and the judges of the admissibility of testimony, 
and the presiding officers of the higher court of the 
Church. I hope that this substitute will prevail 
in the interests of the Church, and in the interests 
of fair play, and in the interests of the true, gen- 
uine, orthodox doctrine of Methodism." 

It did prevail, when Dean Rogers, correcting his 
last statement, had explained that his resolution 
was a substitute, not for the entire resolve of the 
report, but for that part of it which dealt with the 
case of the clerical professor. 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 28T 

The adoption of Dean Rogers' substitute 
rendered it unnecessary for the Committee on 
Judiciary to go farther with the report to which 
he referred (27) , hut it seemed best to the majority 
that it be finished and pubhshed. It was also pre- 
sented to the Conference, but, since there were still 
some members of the Committee who could not 
agree to it, it was merely received, not adopted. 
Still, it is of importance enough as an index of 
opinion among thoughtful Methodists to deserve 
a place in this connection. I take it from the 
Journal of the General Conference, p. 446 : 

"In the matter referred to the Judiciary Com- 
mittee by the Board of Bishops, relating to the 
action of the General Conference Journal of 1904 
and found in Volume 15, General Conference 
Journal, on page 492, under subdivision (d) , which 
reads : 

'The Bishops are hereby authorized and directed, 
whenever specific charges of misteaching in any of 
our theological schools are made in writing by re- 
sponsible parties, members or ministers of our 
Church, to appoint a committee of their own num- 
ber to investigate such charges, whose report, if 
adopted by the Bishops, shall be transmitted to the 
trustees of the theological schools involved for 
proper action in the premises.' 

Your Committee begs leave to report as follows : 
In the opinion of the maj ority of the Committee the 
paragraph recited is unconstitutional and therefore 



288 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

void. A minority of the Committee hold that the 
power of the General Conference to make the said 
rule is not limited by the Restrictive Rules, and 
therefore the said paragraph is not unconstitu- 
tional. 

All concur in the opinion that the provisions of 
said paragraph are not in harmony with our gen- 
eral law relating to the duty of Bishops as Presi- 
dents of Annual Conferences and Judicial Con- 
ferences, while sitting to try accused persons, but 
is wholly inconsistent therewith and tending to pre- 
judice the trial of such persons by reason of an 
opinion formed and expressed, founded upon an 
ex parte investigation made by a committee of the 
Board of Bishops, one of whom must, or may, pre- 
side at the trial. 

Your Committee further expresses the opinion 
that said paragraph, if constitutional, in as far as 
it directs the Board of Bishops to cause an investi- 
gation to be made by a committee of its own mem- 
bers and report the result thereof to the said 
trustees, is so completely at variance with the other 
provisions of the act of which it constitutes a part, 
and with the general law of the Church relative to 
trials and investigations, that it ma}^ be regarded 
as directory only, and not mandatory." 

The Judiciary Committee, when the above report 
was presented, might have called attention to the 
conflict between it and parts of Report 18, the one 
on my complaint, and formally withdrawn the 
latter. The Chairman refrained from so doing be- 
cause he thought the result would be the same if he 
simply neglected to present it, and he was afraid 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 289 

that if he called it up for any purpose he would 
provoke a discussion of the constitutionality of the 
law of 1904 for which the Conference had no time. 
The result was not the same. What happened, 
was that someone, presumably a Secretary, on the 
authority of some other person or persons unknown 
made in the records of the Conference an entry to 
the eifect that this Report was presented and ap- 
proved, and the same or some other person inserted 
the report itself, so that, when the Journal was 
published these entries appeared as records of 
actual proceedings. The mysterious error, of 
course, was so misleading that I could not but 
earnestly request its correction. Nor could the 
Secretary of the Conference, Dr. Hingeley, but 
give the matter his equally earnest attention ; but it 
was not until the Conference of 1912 that, with the 
assistance of Dean Rogers, he was able to secure 
the passage of the following explanation and cor- 
rection, copied from the Advocates of May 28, 
1912: 

The Case of H. G. Mitchell. 

Henry Wade Rogers : As Chairman of the Jud- 
iciary Committee of the Conference held at Balti- 
more I wish to call your attention to the fact a mis- 
take has been made in the publication of the Journal 
Report No. 18, on page 475. That report relates 



290 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

to the case of Hinckley G. Mitchell. There are two 

questions before the Judiciary Committee at Balti- 
more, and Report No. 18 was printed in the Daily 
Advocate, but was never acted upon by the General 
Conference. As Chairman of that Committee, act- 
ing under the instructions of the Committee, we 
withheld that report from the General Conference, 
but through some mistake of the secretaries it was 
improperly printed in the Journal. I desire to call 
the attention of this Conference to the fact in order 
that the proper correction may be made, and a reso- 
lution on this subject will now be presented by Dr. 
Hingeley, the Secretary of the Conference. 

Whereas, In the Journal of the General Confer- 
ence of 1908, page 435, it is recorded that Report 
No. 18, of the Committee on Judiciary, touching the 
case of the appeal by H. G. Mitchell was "Ap- 
proved," and 

Whereas, In fact, the said Report was withheld 
in favor of a later proposal, and the statement cited 
above is an evident error, and that therefore Report 
No. 18, which appears on pages 475-476 of the 
Journal of 1908, should have been omitted from the 
Journal. 

Therefore, Be it resolved, that the Secretary be 
directed to make this statement in the Journal of 
1912. 

(Signed) Joseph B. Hingeley, Secretary. 
Henry Wade Rogers, Chairman 
of the Committee on Judiciary." 

The foregoing resolution was adopted. 

I was pleased with this action of the General 
Conference, because, although it did not undo the 
mischief that had been wrought, it made it possible 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 291 

for the student of the history of our Church to dis- 
cover that my appeal to the Conference of 1908 
was not in vain, but disclosed the error and danger 
in giving to the Bishops any excuse for invading 
the province of the Annual Conference and restrict- 
ing the freedom of our theological teachers. I 
find from a note appended to my copy of my com- 
plaint that at that time I was questioning whether 
the declaration which the Bishops were requiring 
of such teachers, when their election was before 
them for confirmation, to the effect that they (the 
teachers) sincerely accepted the doctrines and Dis- 
cipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and 
purposed to teach in harmony therewith, was not 
only superfluous in the case of a minister, but a re- 
flection on his character as a member of an Annual 
Conference. Could the Bishops arraign and pun- 
ish him if he broke that pledge? To inquire 
whether he had broken it would be to resume the 
"duty" from which they have been "relieved." 

I have now finally disposed of the Mitchell case, 
and, having done so, I will resume the story of the 
serener activities in which I was chiefly engaged 
when it was settled. I finished my Genesis, as I 
have already stated, before going to Europe in 
1909. I did not then have anything else in hand. 



292 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

Professor Mathews had suggested another subject, 
but, as it was a little aside from my favorite line 
of work, I hesitated to adopt his suggestion. 
When, however, I returned rested, I found my 
courage equal to the task of undertaking a book 
on The Ethics of the Old Testament; and I went 
to work on it. 

I might have followed any of several methods. 
The one I chose was selected because I had decided 
that I wished to write for students, not, however, 
to provide a complete and exhaustive discussion of 
the subject, but rather to present the data in such 
a way as to enable the reader, with some study, to 
get for himself a more comprehensive view of any 
phase of it. To this end I first outlined briefly 
the history of the origin of the various books, or 
parts of books, of the Old Testament, according to 
the best critical authorities, and then, taking each 
of these literary units in chronological order, set 
forth its ideas on the individual topics under per- 
sonal, domestic, and social ethics therein taught or 
implied. It was an undertaking that involved the 
collection, analysis, and arrangement of a mass of 
details that sometimes seemed unmanageable, but 
time and patience finally enabled me to reach tol- 
erably satisfactory results and the publishers to 
issue the book in 1912. 

When I undertook this work I supposed that 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 293 

I was definitely committed to a literary course for 
the rest of my life. I saw no other open to me. 
The President of one Methodist institution had 
told me, indeed, that, if he had a vacancy, he would 
gladly give me a position; but I felt certain that 
no other would take the risk of employing a man 
known to be objectionable to the Bishops, with 
their opportunities for imfavorable influence. If 
I had been younger, it might have occurred to me 
to seek a place in some other denomination; — 
without ceasing to be a Methodist; — but I had 
nearly reached the age at which many think it the 
duty of a teacher to retire, and that would have 
made it seem folly to move in any such direction. 
I am not sure that, sometimes, when I canvassed 
the matter, I did not for a little give place to 
depression. I am quite sure that, when suddenly 
I found that there were those outside the Meth- 
odist Church who still remembered me and still 
retained a favorable opinion of me as an instructor, 
I was very happy. It was in 1910, when, for the 
second time, I was invited to give a course of lec- 
tures at the Harvard Summer School of Theology. 
This time I took for my subjects Has Old Tes- 
tament Criticism Collapsed? and The Extent 
and Significa7ice of the Ungenuine Element in the 
Prophetical Books. The first of these subjects 
was suggested by the Dean of the School, by whose 



294 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

advice the lecture was afterward published in the 
Harvard Theological Review. I was the more 
willing to discuss it because Orr's Problem of the 
Old Testament was then a recent work and 
highly regarded in certain quarters. I discussed 
his theory at some length and gave my reasons for 
rejecting it. I concluded my criticism with the 
words: "Professor Orr's theory will not satisfy 
conservative students of the Old Testament, when 
they understand it. I am sure that it will not con- 
vert any of the critics. It will probably, after 
having served for a season as a half-way house for 
fearful or timid people, go the way of all make- 
shifts and compromises — and be forgotten." 

On the general outlook I added the following 
paragraph, which is a sample of my conservatism; 
a conservatism, not of the letter, but of the spirit, 
of the Hebrew Scriptures: "It can hardly be 
doubted that the Documentary Hypothesis, in 
substantially the prevalent outhnes, has come to 
stay: that is to say, we shall accept the theory that 
the early narratives of the Old Testament are 
composite productions, compiled from various 
sources in which had previously been embodied the 
unfolding conceptions of the Hebrews concerning 
their past. If I were asked to go more into detail, 
I should say that this theory will finally be mod- 
ified to this extent, namely, that the critics will 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 295 

have to agree to refer the original of Deuter- 
onomy to a date nearer 700 than 621 B. C, and 
more clearly to recognize the existence in all of the 
documents of material derived from oral or written 
sources older, and in some cases much older, than 
the documents themselves. These concessions 
made, the result will be just what it was in the 
case of the theory of evolution. At first we 
rejected and anathematized it, because some who 
held it ignored God, and we saw no way to rec- 
oncile it with faith in his sovereignty; but, when 
we realized that no law can execute itself, we 
accepted the new doctrine and found it even more 
worthy of "his eternal power and godhead" than 
our previous ideas concerning the origin of the 
world. So also we shall finally adjust ourselves 
to the idea of evolution as applied to the Pentateuch 
and the Hebrew Scriptures generally, and find in 
it one of our strongest arguments for the divinity 
of their origin." 

In my second lecture I first took my hearers 
rapidly through the prophetical books one after 
another, showing that there were none of them to 
which additions more or less extensive or impor- 
tant had not been made, sometimes by several 
hands. I did not, however, leave these facts to 
produce their natural effect on the minds of those 
who had not given them thorough consideration, 



296 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

but explained how they could be made, not merely 
harmless, but helpful. This I did in the following 
paragraphs : 

"In the first place it is important to consider just 
what is meant by the term 'ungenuine.' It is 
commonly used in the sense of 'spurious' in contrast 
with 'real,' for example, of counterfeits of coins or 
precious stones. In such cases it implies depreci- 
ation of the thing it describes, as well as of the 
counterfeiter. When applied to literature it means 
that the book, or part of a book, so described was 
not written by the person under whose name it cir- 
culates. In this case there may be no intent to de- 
ceive, and, whether there is or not, the term in ques- 
tion does not determine the value of the given book 
or other literary product. Now, the Hebrew had 
no such notions of literary property as we entertain. 
Hence he saw no impropriety in writing under the 
name of a famous character of a by-gone age, or 
adding to a work already written by another any- 
thing that would make his copy of it of greater 
value. This being the prevalent idea and prac- 
tice, 'ungenuine' when applied to Daniel, for ex- 
ample, or any part of Isaiah, becomes practically 
equivalent to 'anonymous,' and no student of the 
Old Testament ought to be afraid of this term, 
seeing that there is none of its books, outside the 
prophetical list, whose real author can be iden- 
tified. 

It is helpful, also, to remember how this anony- 
mous prophetical literature is distributed. The 
prophetic period, from the literary point of view, 
begins with the book of Amos, the date of 
which is about 760 B. C. From that time until the 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 297 

Exile there is an unbroken succession of men of God 
whose names have been preserved as well as the 
substance of their more significant utterances. 
From the time of Ezekiel onward, according to 
tradition, the succession is broken; in other words, 
in the most cruel crises of their history the Chosen 
People were without Prophets to comfort and 
direct them. It is at this point that criticism enters 
its caveat, insisting that the prophetic spirit was 
never more active than during the Exile, and that, 
for more than three and a half centuries after the 
Restoration, there continued to be men who, if they 
did not claim divine inspiration, carried forward the 
work to which the former prophets devoted their 
lives. It was one of these who wrote Is. 40-55, a 
work hardly surpassed in value and significance 
as a product of religious thought, and another 
who was the author of the unique and inspiring 
book of Daniel. These two fill the largest gaps 
left by traditional exegesis, the one having min- 
istered to the need of the Captivity, the other to 
that of the terrible crisis of the Maccabean period. 
As for the rest, they also served their generations, 
leaving behind them, as a part of their work, the 
briefer additions scattered through the prophetic 
literature from Isaiah to Malachi. Thus it is pos- 
sible for one who believes in prophetic inspiration 
to maintain that the history of prophecy is a vindi- 
cation of the teaching of Amos, who said that 'the 
Lord Yahweh doeth naught except he have revealed 
his purpose to his servants the prophets.' 

Finally, let me call your attention to the charac- 
ter of this anonymous element. The early proph- 
ets are generally severe and denunciatory. Their 



298 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

almost constant theme is the sinful condition of 
their people. Most of them see little hope for the 
future, or, if they see any, it is only through a vista 
of oppression and suffering. Those who witnessed 
the fulfilment of the gloomy predictions of Amos 
and Jeremiah had little heart or need for denuncia- 
tion. The sense of sin was only too prevalent and 
oppressive. The great need was comfort and en- 
couragement. Not that hope had even then been 
entirely quenched; for, just as the earlier Hebrews 
saw God in their past, and made their history teach 
them the will of Yahweh, so these later genera- 
tions had an inextinguishable faith in their future, 
and only needed someone to voice their conviction 
that Yahweh would yet comfort and deliver his 
afflicted people. This faith found its grandest ex- 
pression in Isa. 52 : 13ff ., the key to which is 55 : 3f . ; 
for in this passage the prophet turned his back 
upon the visions of dominion the Jews had pre- 
viously cherished and chose for them, as more glor- 
ious than the abundant 'mercies of David', the priv- 
ilege of suffering in the sei^vice of mankind. 

Do not misunderstand me. I do not claim that 
these anonymous books and passages are all of the 
highest order of Scripture. I say only that they 
are often the product of a faith, which, although 
it is sometimes mistaken or fanatical, speaks to 
faith, and therefore I am sure that, whatever the 
critics may say or do, you and I, and the rest of 
the religious world, will keep them in our Bible." 

The lectures above described were given in July, 
1910. Before the summer was gone I had a sec- 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 299 

ond surprise for which I was even less prepared. 
This was when the President of Tufts College 
called and offered me a position in the theological 
department of that institution. I was, of course, 
pleased with the offer, coming, as it did, from a 
stranger who was also a member of a denomination 
in which I had no reason to think that I was widely 
or favorably known. I explained it by supposing 
that one or both of the two members of the Tufts 
Faculty with whom I was acquainted had rec- 
ommended me. That supposition would have 
prompted me to give the matter serious considera- 
tion. When I asked myself whether I could 
accept, I was surprised at the favor with which I 
found myself regarding it. I realized that, 
although I had pursued a literary life with some 
success for the last five years and had become some- 
what accustomed to it, it did not really satisfy me. 
I had missed the opportunities for intimacy with 
eager and earnest young men which my position 
as a teacher had afforded me, and the possibility 
of regaining such a position was very attractive. 
I was not, however, so situated as to be able to 
seize it without hesitation. In the first place, 
although many, when I lost my former position, 
expected me to leave the Methodist Church, I had 
never thought of it, but had always, when it was 
suggested, declared that I should not leave it 



300 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

willingly until I went to heaven. I therefore 
frankly told Dr. Hamilton that I was a Methodist 
and intended to retain my membership and my re- 
lations as a minister in that Communion. Some- 
what to my surprise he replied without hesitation 
that he preferred to have me do so, explaining that 
it was his idea to make his theological department 
interdenominational and he wished me to help him 
in that policy. My second condition met with a 
similar reception, for, when I told him that I had 
for five years been engaged in hterary work, and 
that I did not for the present wish to devote myself 
wholly to teaching, he said that, since the School of 
Theology was undergoing reorganization, he could 
not well give me full work for the time being. 
These points being settled, the rest was easy; when, 
therefore, September came, I entered upon the 
duties of a professor of Hebrew and Old Tes- 
tament Exegesis at the College. My courses, 
however, were made elective in the other depart- 
ments; so that from the first I had students from 
that of Liberal Arts, and, after it was opened, 
from Jackson College for Women. 

Hebrew had previously been elective in the 
Theological School. When I took charge of my 
department, the Faculty did me the honor to make 
it a required study : but, since students who had not 
taken it were admitted to my classes in Exegesis, I 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 301 

found it necessary in them to use the English Ver- 
sion: which had its advantages, among them that 
I was thus able to cover much more ground, in fact 
so large a part of the Old Testament as to give a 
fairly comprehensive idea of its contents. 

Fl-om the first I have had in my classes men and 
women of all shades of religious belief, but they 
have all, naturally, been inclined to be liberal; — 
otherwise they would not have been there; — and 
they have always given me a fair hearing. Indeed, 
they have been so tolerant that sometimes my work 
has seemed tame in comparison with my previous 
experience as a teacher, when my time and thought 
were largely given to explaining and defending 
the positions that my studies had compelled me to 
take, and I have had to consider ways and means 
of arousing interest in my courses. I have 
succeeded to some extent by going over the lesson 
to be assigned beforehand and calling attention to 
points which were especially important. By this 
method I am able to show the student how to 
attack a subject and prevent him from making 
mistakes, the later correction of which might em- 
barrass, perhaps discourage him. I do not, how- 
ever, carry this method so far as to relieve him en- 
tirely from the necessity of thinking for himself, 
but encourage him thereto by a daily series of ques- 
tions which require more or less study and careful 



302 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

written answers, to be presented at the next rec- 
itation. Finally there is the occasional essay on 
some more general subject, in the preparation of 
which there is abundant opportunity for independ- 
ent thought. My estimate of the student's ability 
and proficiency is based largely on the character 
of these essays. 

One phase of my experience in teaching the Old 
Testament at Tufts has been new. There are 
many Jews in the College. When, therefore, my 
courses were made elective, these young men and 
women were as much entitled to take them as any- 
one. I rather expected that some of them would 
wish to study Hebrew with me. They would have 
done so had the hour at which it was given ever 
suited them. I did not expect them to be so much 
interested in my interpretation of their Scriptures. 
I was therefore somewhat surprised when a young 
man who was himself teaching in the Jewish 
schools of Boston applied for admission to a course 
on the Hebrew Narratives. I was also agreeably 
surprised to find him, not only very studious, but 
ready to eschew rabbinical methods and apply to 
his Scriptures the recognized rules of scientific 
Exegesis. Naturally he made a good record. He 
showed his appreciation of the work done, not only 
by staying with me a second semester, but by 
bringing four of his Jewish friends with him. 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 303 

This time the subject was The Prophets. We did 
not attempt to read all the prophetical books, or 
indeed, the whole of any of them; but we read 
enough of the most important to enable a thought- 
ful student to get a pretty clear idea of the mission 
of the prophets as a class and become acquainted 
with the more striking personal, hterary, and doc- 
trinal peculiarities of those whose books we studied. 
I took pains to show the relation of these men of 
God to the people and the events of the periods to 
which they belonged and the progress of doctrine 
among them from one period to another. When 
we came to the prophecies usually called Messianic 
I insisted on giving them the meaning their authors 
evidently intended to convey and those to whom 
they were addressed naturally found in them. 
Following this rule I had to say that Isa. 7: 14-16, 
for example, was not Messianic in any proper 
sense, but that Isa. 9 : 5f . promised an ideal king 
of the Hne of David, that is, one so abundantly 
endowed with the spirit of God that he would be a 
perfect instrument of the divine will. I made the 
human origin and the earthly mission of this king 
so clear that it was not necessary in so many words 
to deny his identity with Jesus of Nazareth, or 
even to mention our Lord in this connection; and I 
refrained from so doing. I did not, however, 
intend to hide my faith in him or my ideas concern- 



304 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

ing his place in the history of redemption. An 
.opportunity to declare myself occurred while we 
were studying Isa. 40-55. We had nearly reached 
the last of those chapters, and I had explained how 
the author, a prophet (or prophets) of the Exile, 
abandoning the expectation of deliverance and 
prosperity through the agency of an ideal Hebrew 
ruler, was teaching his people to look for release 
from captivity by Cyrus, but to take upon them- 
selves, as an ideal people, the task of bringing, not 
only every Hebrew, but the world, to the knowl- 
edge and service of the true God. It was while 
we were discussing this Servant of Yahweh that 
one of the Jewish members of the class very quietly 
remarked that in the New Testament the language 
used of the Servant was applied to Jesus, as if the 
evangelists believed that the prophet had him in 
mind. I admitted without hesitation not only 
that the evangelists had written in the way 
described, but that they and the Jews generally of 
their time evidently gave the prophet credit for 
ability to foresee the appearance of persons and 
events centuries in advance; also that Christian 
theologians in the past had expressly taught, and 
the mass of believers probably still accepted, some 
such doctrine. "But," I said, "I have shown that 
the Servant of Yahweh was not an individual, but 
a collection of persons, and, this being the case, we 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 305 

must put the matter of the relation of Jesus to the 
prophets otherwise. The prophets were practical 
rehgious teachers. In the so-called Messianic 
prophecies they were trying to show their people 
how, and how only, they could, as a people, obtain 
deliverance from present troubles and attain the 
commanding position among the nations which 
they coveted. When Jesus appeared he not only 
taught a similar doctrine, he set about the estab- 
lishment of the long delayed kingdom foretold in 
the seventh chapter of the book of Daniel, the king- 
dom represented by 'a son of man.' When he be- 
gan to meet opposition he found in the faith and 
patience and devotion of the Servant of Yahweh 
a program for the remainder of his mission, and, 
when he had finished his course, his disciples iden- 
tified him with that heroic figure. That means," 
I said, — *'and, if I were a Jew, I should be proud 
of the fact, — ^that the Hebrew prophets provided 
the program followed centuries later by the 
Founder of the Christian Church." I am glad to 
be able to say that the men to whom this explana- 
tion was addressed received it with apparent sat- 
isfaction and that the Jewish students whom I 
have since had in my classes have shown equal 
intelligence and liberality. 

It was in the year 1915-16 that the first Jews 
came into my classes. That same year my de- 



306 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

partment was enlarged to the extent that I be- 
gan to give instruction in the New as well as in the 
Old Testament. The Dean had more than once 
suggested that I undertake this work, but I had 
asked to be excused. My main reason for so doing 
was that I did not feel prepared for it. I had, it 
is true, always had a fondness for Greek, and in 
the last year of my theological course I had read 
the New Testament in the original several times, 
but I had not given it the time and thought that I 
had expended on the Hebrew Scriptures, and I 
could not think anyone competent to interpret it 
who had not made it a specialty. I felt 30 
strongly in the matter that I should have persisted 
in excusing myself if I had not been made to feel 
that there was at the time no one available who 
was better prepared to fill the vacancy, at least 
temporarily, and that the New Testament could 
no longer be neglected as it had been since Dr. 
Harmon's retirement. In view of this situation I 
was obliged to reconsider the matter and ask my- 
self what parts or subjects in the New Testament 
were of first importance to our students, and 
whether I was fitted, or could speedily fit myself, 
to handle them helpfully. I decided that, since our 
students were, first of aU, professed disciples of 
Jesus preparing to commend him and his teaching 
to the world, they needed above everything else to 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 307 

know him, his life in Palestine, his work among his 
people, and the spirit in which he fulfilled his mis- 
sion. "Next," I said to myself, "as future preach- 
ers, with a message, they should know the history 
of the infant Church, and seek especially to learn 
the secret of the success of that greatest of mis- 
sionaries, the apostle Paul." It was about the 
first of June when I came to this conclusion. The 
next day I heard Dr. Gordon, at the beginning of 
a lecture on Dante, say, in substance, that anyone 
who knew thoroughly one great character was an 
educated person; whereupon I took the first op- 
portunity to report to the Dean that I would the 
coming year, and every other year thereafter, with 
his approval, substitute for the Hebrew of the first 
semester a three-hour course in the Gospels, and 
in the second give two hours a week to the Acts 
and one to Introduction to the New Testament; 
and that has since been the program. 

Having decided upon the scope of my work, I 
proceeded at once, with a Harmony of the Gospels 
for a text-book, to prepare a series of lessons, each 
with an analysis of a certain portion of the quad- 
ruple Gospel and a series of questions based on it, 
after the manner of my papers on the Old Tes- 
tament. I spent the next three months on them. 

I have elsewhere explained that in the past I 
had been careful not to commit myself very def- 



308 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

initely on some prolblems of the New Testament. 
I now saw that I could not expect longer to occupy 
such a position, but that I must give these problems 
my best thought and, if possible, in each case reach 
a conclusion which I could conscientiously 
commend to those who sought my help. I had 
immediate occasion to put this resolution into 
practice, namely with reference to the stories of the 
birth and childhood of Jesus. I had never denied 
them, but I had said in 1895 that, if I ever felt 
obliged so to do, I could still believe in the divinity 
of our Lord. After some serious study I felt 
obhged to go farther and admit that, although 
there could be no doubt that the Gospels of 
Matthew and Luke, as we had them, evidently 
taught that the child Jesus was miraculously 
conceived, there were certain facts which gave rise 
to pardonable doubt concerning their evidential 
value in the matter. The facts which influenced 
me are the following: 

In the first place, there is a mysterious lack of 
confirmatory evidence to this great miracle from 
sources from which it was to be expected ; for Mark 
does not mention it, and there are apparently no 
references to it in the logia of Matthew, one of the 
sources from which the Gospel of that name was 
compiled. Moreover we look in vain for any trace 
of familiarity with it elsewhere in the New Tes- 
tament. 



AT THE SEAT OF AUTHORITY 309 

Secondly, when one inquires where the authors 
of the first and third Gospels got the material for 
their accounts of the birth and childhood of Jesus, 
one cannot but be reminded of the freedom with 
which the former handles prophecy, and of the 
similarity between the stories of the latter and 
some in the Old Testament, for example. Gen. 22 
(Isaac), Ex. 2: Iff. (Moses), and I Sam. 3 (Sam- 
uel) , all of which are of secondary origin. 

Finally, these stories of the nativity are not in 
themselves convincing; for the genealogies do not 
make Jesus a son of David, and conception by the 
Holy Spirit is not a satisfactory explanation of the 
unique relation between him and the Heavenly 
Father, or the wonderful fruits of his mission to 
mankind. 

There are those who, in their haste, would accuse 
me of having denied the divinity of Jesus, but that 
would be unjust, as the last sentence ought to be 
sufficient to show, for it implies that I would give 
him a greater place in the minds and hearts of men 
than that of which Matthew and Luke sought to 
prove him worthy. I find better proof elsewhere, 
for example, in the account of the baptism, where 
Matthew and Luke say that, as Jesus was coming 
from the water, the Spirit descended upon him 
and a voice from heaven greeted him with "Thou 



310. FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

art my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." 
One is reminded by these words of those of the 
second psahn, "Thou art my son; this day have I 
begotten thee"; which denote a unique relation, 
but do not define its precise character. In the 
case of Jesus, however, there is the clearest indica- 
tion that his sonship was of the Spirit; also, per- 
haps, that he now for the first time realizes his 
unique dignity and its significance. What it 
meant to him appears in his saying (Matt. 11: 27; 
Luke 10: 21) "All things have been delivered unto 
me of my Father, and no one knoweth the Son save 
the Father, neither doth any know the Father save 
the Son and he to whomsoever the Son willeth to 
reveal him"; and what it meant to the world in 
the gracious invitation following in which he sum- 
moned "all that labor and are heavy laden" to come 
to the Father through him. The consciousness of 
this sonship dominated his hfe and. . . . 



SOME TRIBUTES 

A TRIBUTE FROM DR. LEE S. MCCOLLESTER^ DEAN 

OF THE CRANE THEOLOGICAL SCHOOL, 

TUFTS COLLEGE 

In this service of affection and honor, it is my 
privilege to speak of the Dr. Mitchell of the last 
period of his life. He had been educated a Metho- 
dist, and the activities of his middle years were in 
a Methodist college. He closed his work as a 
teacher in a Universalist theological school. He 
loved his old associations, and held on to those who 
had been his friends with an unwavering affection. 
He enjoyed his new associations, and made friends 
of all who worked with him. In his thinking he 
could not be limited by any sect, but recognized the 
good in all. He belonged to the group of honest, 
brave searchers for the truth. He was a ripe 
scholar of history and theology, but always a brave 
and open-minded student of new knowledge and 
fresh revelations. With a quietness which was 
mighty he uttered his convictions and moved 
steadily ahead. 

Others here have spoken of his earlier years. I 

311 



312 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

did not know him until I came to Tufts to be the 
Dean of Crane Theological School. He had al- 
ready become well established there. When he left 
Boston University, Crane Theological School was 
in need of a teacher of Old Testament, and it wel- 
comed him as man and scholar. This was a 
fortunate association for both. He brought 
scholarship and inspiration and the position gave 
him absolute freedom. He was regarded as an 
expert in his department, and his conclusions were 
received with respect. He had been deeply and 
irreparably hurt by experiences before he came to 
us, and yet he loved the old association with an 
unwavering affection. At Tufts he was free to 
love the old, and to rejoice in the new. Often he 
said to me, "It is for you to counteract my Method- 
ist utterances with your Universalist conclusions. 
I shall teach the truth as I see it, whether I am in a 
Methodist or a Universalist environment." The 
last years were happy years to him. We loved him 
for his fine personality, enjoyed him in his clean 
humor, and prized him for his wonderful teaching 
qualities. He was above all things a teacher; 
always a student himself, he was always a teacher 
of others. Year by year the requirements in He- 
brew as necessary in the modern theological train- 
ing have been reduced, and likewise the disinclina- 



SOME TRIBUTES 313 

tion to take Hebrew as basic to the ministry has 
increased. But Dr. JNIitchell was more than a task- 
master in Hebrew. On one occasion I required a 
young man to take Hebrew. He objected, said he 
did not want it, and should never use it. I quite 
agreed with him, but still insisted that he should 
take Hebrew. He brought to me his father, who 
also protested against my requirement. Then I 
explained, "What I am urging is not a course in 
Hebrew just for the sake of the language, but a 
Course in Mitchell for the benefit of the 
exact training which he gives, and for the close 
association with his fine personality which is itself 
a liberal education. Your son needs what no one 
save Dr. ^Mitchell can give. And let us not call it 
a course in Hebrew, but a course in Mitchell." 
The young man, protesting, went at the work, 
and at the end of the year came back and said, 
"Next year I want another Course in Mitchell.^^ 
Dr. Mitchell had two notable qualities as a teacher : 
one, that of exactness, intellectual drill; and the 
other, a personal love for the earnest student. He 
loved every man who sought to do good work. 
And every man who had work with him loved him 
as a teacher and a friend. He never let go of a 
man after he had once become interested in him. 
He did not think ever^^ man who studied with him 
was necessarilv meant for a minister. He had a 



314 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

peculiar power of finding out for what a man was 
fitted and for finding the place which fitted the 
man. Not many weeks ago he came to a con- 
clusion that a certain young man, a graduate, was 
not where he was having adequate opportunity. 
By a kind of second sense he felt out a position, 
quite outside of Dr. Mitchell's usual association, 
and put the man in a work where he is succeeding 
splendidly. My extensive travelling since coming 
to Tufts, in the interest of college and denomina- 
tion, has brought me an association with men of all 
churches, and I have been tremendously interested 
at the question put to me when it became known 
that I was from Tufts. The primary question 
was, "Do you know Dr. Mitchell? I want to tell 
you that that man's methods, clear and brave think- 
ing, and rich personality have given me more than 
I have gotten from any other teacher." Thus 
everywhere have I been impressed with the far- 
reaching effects of the life and teachings of Dr. 
Mitchell. 

During the years of my personal association with 
him, I have learned to value many admirable qual- 
ities. He had a rare humor. His quiet chuckle 
over some amusing story read, or incident expe- 
rienced, was dehcious. I think it was this sense of 
humor that helped to carry him bravely through 
his hard places. Often on arriving at the College 



SOME TRIBUTES 315 

he would stop at my office and repeat a story. It 
was a delightful habit we all cherished. Another 
notable quality in his conduct was his appreciation 
of kindnesses. We loved him so that at the Col- 
lege we gave him free way, and very often he went 
out of his path to say to us, "You are very good to 
me and I am very happy here." He was a gentle 
heretic, but a very brave one. He did not agree 
with the Methodist Church on some interpretations 
of scripture and history. Neither did he ever court 
favor with us by loosely saying he was a 
Universalist. He was never a dogmatist so far 
as creed is concerned, but an honest student 
seeking the truth, and when he had found it in 
some new aspect, brave enough to utter it, 
whether it found favor or opposition. He 
was a man who trusted God and feared not 
man. 

I should not fulfil my privilege here today if 
I did not refer to his devotion to Mrs. Mitchell. 
His was a rare chivalry. We sometimes thought 
he used his strength on details which another might 
have done as well, and consequently did not save 
himself for services which none but he could give. 
But such doubt as this I would not utter were it 
not that his devotion to the invalid comrade of his 
life was absolute and chivalrous. He carried to 
her his best. He lived for her. He died for her. 



316 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

And through it all, spoke never a word save, "I 
would that I might do more that she might be 
well again." 

He left us suddenly. The night before his lips 
became silent, he spent a happy evening with some 
of his recent graduates. It was an evening they 
will, always remember with gratitude. And the 
special joy of it was that he was so cheery and for- 
ward-looking. The morning of his death he arose 
as usual, as usual had his breakfast, and as usual 
was getting together the material for his classes. 
And then he went, not knowing that he was going. 
And we are here today to praise him. Our College 
would have been glad to have had these services 
in Goddard Chapel on the Hill, but this is in many 
ways, a fitter place. This is a place typical of 
him. He belonged not to one church or one school. 
He belonged to truth and broad education. He 
belonged to the school and to the city. He was 
a friend to man. This place belongs really to no 
sect. It stands in the midst of busy road^ of travel. 
Its place beside the silent graves, under tall busi- 
ness blocks, touches with an appeal of faith the 
thoughts of all sorts of people. It suggests rev- 
erence, faith, destiny, God. He belonged to edu- 
cation, to religion, to the highways of learning and 
conduct. I devoutly believe that we are doing 
what he would like to have us do, and that as we 



SOME TRIBUTES 31T 

go away from this significant hour and place we 
shall please him if we carry with us the thought of 
the poet, 

I cannot say and will not say 
That he is dead, — he is just away! 

With a cheery smile, and a wave of the hand, 
He has wandered into an unknown land, 

And left us dreaming how very fair 
It needs must be, since he lingers there. 

Think of him still as the same, I say: 
He is not dead, — he is just away! 



FROM A LETTER WRITTEN TO MRS. MITCHELL FROM 
REV. DAVIS WASGATT CLARK 

"As we were standing in the vestibule of King's 
Chapel — ^waiting for the signal — the doors were 
thrown open — the lights turned on and the organ 
gave one clear note of Triumph. As his ministe- 
rial guard and Escort Twenty Strong moved down 
the center aisle one word was in my mind, 'Vic- 
tory.' 

"The thought was expressed that the very place 
of the service was significant — for he belonged to 
no one denomination, but like King's Chapel to all 
and to the city and state as well. 

"It was impressive, when as if in an interlude, 
in the ritual — the remark was made, 'I now read 
from the Prophet Amos whose exploiter Dr. Mit- 
chell was — showing the mind of Jehovah's mes- 



318 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

senger as few have known it worthy to be the 
Prophet's companion and friend' — The passage 
was Amos V. 

"The chmax came when the last speaker said, 
with quiet dignity and fineness like a judge render- 
ing a decision. 'It has been the unhappy habit of 
the Church to throw stones at its prophets, possibly 
not so much so of late as formerly. The very pa- 
tience and fortitude of the prophets has been the 
indictment of the church in every age. And the 
paradox of it is that after the last stone has been 
thrown the chm^ch comes around to accept the teach- 
ing of the prophet it has stoned.' 

"Nothing could have been more appropriate than 
the service thoughout — a tribute of scholars to a 
scholar — dignified and solemn — ^yet with conscious- 
ness of triumph and its attendant joy. It was 
worthy of Dr. Mitchell and he was worthy of 
King's Chapel." 

A TRIBUTE ritOM WILLIAM EDWARDS 
HUNTINGTON 

"It relieves the sorrow we feel in parting from 
our beloved friend and former colleague, to recall 
in memory the essential traits of his noble character. 

"He came to his work for Boston University 
through years of strenuous study, four in Wesleyan 
University and three in the School of Theology, 
Boston University. It was not perfunctory work 
that he did in these preparatory stages of his disci- 
pline. He bent to his tasks with an eagerness and 



SOME TRIBUTES 319 

persistency, that took him far beyond the prescribed 
work of the class-room. His aim was not simply 
to pass examinations and gain the regular degrees ; 
he worked for the joy of mastery in the chosen field 
of oriental languages and their literature — es- 
pecially in that of the Hebrew Bible. Yet scholar- 
ship for the bibhcal teacher, as he conceived it, must 
be flooded with a thoroughly reverent spirit. This 
he possessed, and it was recognized and felt by all 
his appreciative students. He could not under- 
stand that orthodoxy compelled him to turn his back 
upon the best religious and philosophic scholarship 
of his time. He beheved it possible to be both loyal 
to his church and a faithful interpreter of biblical 
truth. He was both a peer among scholars and a 
leader among the guides in modern Christianity. 
In the field of Christian culture, as Boston Uni- 
versity represented it, he was a worthy fellow 
teacher with William F. Warren, Borden P. Bowne 
and Henry C. Sheldon. 

"When the storm of opposition broke upon him 
in 1903-04 from those who misunderstood or mis- 
stated his doctrinal views, and when by Episcopal 
authority he was no longer to hold his place in the 
University, he was sorely grieved but not em- 
bittered; he suffered but did not indulge in angry 
resistance; he submitted but did not abate a jot or 
tittle of his convictions regarding revealed truth. 



320 FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY CREDITORS 

"The strength and serenity in which he passed 
through that trying crisis gave abundant proof of 
the greatness of his character. His gentle voice 
was never used in raihng against ecclesiastical 
authority. His tender heartedness was not chilled. 
It was the same loving friend who watched with al- 
most paternal interest the careers of his students, 
and helped them whenever and wherever he could, 
after his separation from the University as he did 
before. 

"The unwritten history of his domestic conditions, 
if it were written, would reveal a second back- 
ground of affection, tender care and solicitude for 
his companion, through all the years of their 
wedded life, which would bring out in full sig- 
nificance the choice lineaments of his character. 
For the last decade of their united life Mrs. Mitchell 
was under such physical infirmity as made her a 
prisoner in her rooms, and as she continues to be, 
all the weariness and pain of this prolonged invalid- 
ism is borne by this noble woman with amazing 
patience and fortitude ; and on his part, the anxiety, 
the watching, the delicate attentions in the sick 
room, and unconquerable cheerfulness and hope, 
were never wanting and never flagged even when 
his personal load was hard to bear. His soul was 
not only mellowed by such experiences in his home, 
but the strong fibers of his character were made 



SOME TRIBUTES 321 

more firm, enabling him in the days of 'contra- 
diction of sinners' and of mistaken saints to hold 
himself with power and not in passion, in the quiet 
' of an unshaken Faith." 

FROM THE TRIBUTE OF HOWARD N. BROWN, 
MINISTER AT KING's CHAPEL, BOSTON 

"I cannot forbear to add here one word of per- 
sonal tribute in honor of a man to whom my heart 
has long given instinctive reverence. In all periods 
of the life of the church it has had a bad habit of 
casting stones at its own prophets and pioneers. It 
is better in our day than in past ages ; but this man 
suffered, as others have had to suffer, because he 
bore witness to the truth. He really belongs to 
the noble army of martyrs. And he bore his un- 
deserved rebuke as a martyr should, with beauti- 
ful patience, forbearance and fortitude; without a 
trace of bitterness, so far as one could see in thought 
or speech. The world has to accept the teaching 
of such men in the end, and it is what opens the 
door to all the opportunities of coming time. All 
honor to the brave heart and quiet spirit which the 
world could neither frighten nor overawe. He 
spoke God's truth; and he has left a mark upon the 
world's consciousness which time will not efface." 



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